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desire to ask anything?" The question infuriated the gentleman and he said in all excitement: "I have nothing to ask. I have only to request you, kindly to put an end to all this nonsense! All the lectures delivered about the Navakara Mantra for three full days are a big humbugs!" The organizer got simply stunned by this sudden, unexpected attack. At last he met me and narrated the whole incident.
I too got interested and keen to inquire into this case. I asked the gentleman in all warmth: "Will you please narrate to me as to how and upto what time you have propitiated and chanted the Navakara ?"
"See, for the last 36 years I have been chanting the Navakara. No practical described in manuscripts and heard of from authoritative persons is kept out during the course of my Sadhana. I have stood in the midst of water during winter and in the midst of fires on all sides in summer and have chanted the Mantra. No miracle is experienced and no peace of mind obtained. I am simply tired, fed up. I have therefore come to return this Mantra to Shankheshvar Dada. I had learnt it in his presence from my mother. Kindly preach nothing more now about the glory of the Navakara! No more of it, please!"
On hearing this, I was amazed for a while. I had absolute faith with regard to the glory and greatness of the Mantra. Here, on the other side, was a man with Sadhana of 36 years with the result being blank. A veritable challenge indeed for me!
I sought refuge at the feet of my Shri Gurudev and started the chanting of the Navakara Mantra. Very next moment the idea struck in my mind that "This gentleman must have taken to lots of external rituals, but there must
