General Hanut Meets Shivabalayogi
I had been looking for a
siddha purusha, a realized soul, since
I was a child. I wanted to a guru
whose teaching I could follow. I
used to read from books, follow a certain path, and I would read something else.
I used to be attracted by that and I followed different paths. I also
realized that unless I was stable in the spiritual practice that I was doing, I
wouldn’t attain anything very much.
So I used to travel to all the places where saints and mahatmas were known to reside. I went to Rishikesh. I went to Badrinath. I went to Gangotri and Kashi. I met all the sadhus and saints there who were reputed to be great saints. They were undoubtedly great saints in their own right, but none of them attracted me internally. I was not attracted towards them. I revered them, but I could not believe that I could follow them as guru.
I first heard of Shri Shivabalayogi Maharaj in the summer of
1968. One day I got a telephone call
from a close and dear friend of mine, Major (later General) Ajai Singh.
He was then posted at
Then when I came to
During this period I was afflicted by chronic amoebic dysentery which had been with me for almost ten years. Hari Singhji of Jalalpur suggested that I visit a Swami who was at Dehradun at that time and who was effecting many miracle cures. I was so distraught because of my debilitating disease that I was prepared to try anything.
In June of 1968, I went to Dehradun on a short holiday. When I arrived, I got the address where Swamiji was staying. It was a Sunday and I was informed that Swamiji gave darshan from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. We reached the house at about 5:30 p.m. When the door opened for darshan I went in. As I entered the room where Shri Swamiji was giving darshan, Swamiji was sitting on the bed in a very in drawn mood. In those days, Swamiji used to be in a meditative mood most of the time. I observed a yogi wearing only a kaupina, with long matted hair and seated on a tiger skin. He had a withdrawn meditative look on his face and there was an atmosphere of deep calm and supreme peace pervading the room.
The moment I saw Him, something within me got pulled towards him. Something within me was greatly attracted by him. Immediately the thought struck me, “Your long quest for your Guru has ended. There in front of you sits your Guru!” So I sat down and kept gazing at Swamiji. I was at once captivated by the yogi and could not take my eyes off him. I barely noticed the others in the room. I had eyes only for this mahatma. I was gazing at him critically. I wanted to make up my own mind whether he was the person I was looking for. The more I looked at him, the more I saw him, the more I felt yes. He was the person that I had been looking for so long.
Then when the bhajan and kirtan (spiritual song) started, Swamiji went into dhyana (meditation) and he went into deep samadhi. To me it appeared like samadhi because it was a very deep state of dhyana which he had gone into and he appeared to be totally unconscious of the outer world. That further convinced me that my initial intuition had been correct and Swamiji was one person I would like to follow, if he accepted me.
That evening, for the first time, I heard kirtan done in Shri Swamiji’s presence and saw the wonderful leela of devotees going into bhava. I was enthralled not only with what I saw, but particularly with what I personally experienced during that kirtan.
In all the books I had been reading, it was mentioned that “When the time is ripe, your Guru will come of his own accord,” and “You don’t have to search for a Guru; he will search you out and draw you to him,” and so on. Whenever I heard of a great mahatma, I would go and visit him in the hope that perhaps he may be the Guru I was looking for, but none attracted me to the extent that I would want to be their disciple. The Guru-disciple relationship is very deep and very sacred and to those who understand it, it not easily entered into. Thus my sense of gratification and fulfillment at finding my own longed and searched for a Guru.
General Hanut (right) and Adinarayan (left) standing beside Shivabalayogi
who is sitting on his asana at the Dehradun ashram.
I had been given a letter of introduction to Rani Saheba of
Maharini Saheba passed on the letter I had brought to Shri Veerabhadraiah who was attending Shri Swamiji at that time. Shri Veerabhadraiah conveyed the contents of the letter to Swamiji who asked whether I wanted the vibhuti (blessed ash) now or would I wait. Of course, I agreed to wait.
Later Swamiji called me and said, “If I give you some vibhuti, will you take it?”
“I will gladly take it.”
He gave me some vibhuti and asked me to take it with water three times a day after duly worshipping it. I carried out his injunctions as directed and when I took the vibhuti, I began to feel as though my entire system was being purged and flushed. This carried on for two to three days and, to all outward appearances, the disease instead of abating had taken a turn for the worse. But disregarding all this, I continued taking the vibhuti and did not touch any of the numerous medicines which I had been taking habitually almost daily. By about the third day, there were signs of improvement and I felt a sense of well being that I had not experienced for years. Thereafter, there was steady improvement until I was fully cured of this foul disease, something that doctors had been unable to do for ten long years in spite of administering the best available allopathic medicines.
I think a day or two after that first day, after the conviction had grown in me, I inquired whether I could take initiation from Him. To my surprise, Swamiji said yes. I should come on Thursday. So I went on Thursday very excited because I felt that at last I was on the threshold of starting off on a spiritual sadhana (practice) I had been wanting to indulge in all my life, to that point of time.
There was nobody else for the initiation that day. I was the only candidate. I was made to sit in front of Swamiji and Mr. Adinarayana. Was it Mr. Adinarayana or Mr. Veerabhadraiah? One of them. I’m not sure now. He came to me, told me to close my eyes, and pressed me between the eyebrows. Possibly he applied vibhuti there. I’m not sure. He told me to concentrate on that point.
So I sat in dhyana in front of Swamiji for about an hour. Swamiji was there all the time. A deep sense of peace flooded me during that period. When it was over, I was asked to open my eyes and I was given some instructions which I did not follow in their entirety. But I did understand this much, that I was to concentrate on the point between the eyebrows.
Then Swamiji told me personally that, “You should make sure when you are doing dhyana, your vision should be steady. Your eyes, eyeballs should not flicker. That will automatically bring steadiness in your meditation.” These two points I grasped, which I suppose were adequate for a beginner.
Then during the kirtan that followed, Anang [Singh Deo] went into bhava and he repeatedly came and with his thumb kept pressing me or putting a mark on my bhrikuti, the point between the eyebrows. And repeatedly he would tap me on the back. Then one of the ladies who was in bhava came and she ran her hands on my stomach. I was new to all this, so I thought possibly these are means by which Swamiji is conveying His blessings. I felt nothing in particular except that I had better dhyana during the kirtan that followed than during the initiation period itself.
But I was so attracted by that dhyana that I had done at that time, that I started coming regularly there and sitting in the presence of Swamiji and doing meditation. At that time, the routine used to be that the first one hour was devoted to dhyana. Then if there were any aspirants for initiation, they used to be given initiation on Thursdays and Sundays. For the rest, during that one hour period, whoever wanted to could come and sit in dhyana and Swamiji used to be sitting there personally Himself. By the spiritual power that used to emanate from Swamiji during those days, we used to go into a state of deep dhyana without any effort on our part. We used to be surprised when the hour ended and Mr. Veerabhadraiah started the kirtan. We used to feel that, “Oh why are they starting the kirtan. We should continue a little longer.”
General Hanut with Shivabalayogi
at the Dehradun ashram.
General Hanut is the author of the first biography of Shivabalayogi available in
the West,
Shri Shri Shri Shivabalayogi Maharaj, Life & Spiritual Ministration,
published in 1981.
But, again, after the initial disturbance, the kirtan used to create a very pleasant sort of an atmosphere which induced one to go into another session of dhyana. We used to sit in dhyana during the kirtan also. And at times it used to be so strong, that the arthi used to follow and people used to disperse but there was no inclination of terminating the dhyana and wanting to get up and go. I was conscious of the fact that people are dispersing and that it was time for Swamiji’s evening meal. Food had been brought in and I should leave, because Swamiji would not begin to eat in the presence of His devotees. I was completely new to them. But I couldn’t open my eyes.
I couldn’t open my eyes. Consciously I wanted to get up but I couldn’t open my eyes and I didn’t want to force myself to leave. So eventually somebody would come with a little vibhuti and press that vibhuti at the bhrikuti and keep tapping me for some time. And then my eyes would open. When I looked at Swamiji after that, I would find him smiling at me. I used to smile a little self-consciously because I had kept everybody waiting, then quickly go to pranam (bow) to Swamiji and leave.
I had only a fortnight leave at that time and that’s how I spent that wonderful period of leave.
That was not my first experience of meditation, but until then I really did not know what was the correct technique of meditation. I used to simply sit with my eyes closed and I would do japa or try to bring a picture of my ishtadeva (fomr of God one prefers to worship) in front of my eyes and concentrate on that. Somewhere else I had read that you should keep your mantra in front of your mind so I tried to keep that. It kept varying according to what I read or what I heard people saying. There was no specific technique I was following. Actually, I was not progressing in any direction.
Of course, more important than all that is that in dhyana, it is not the mantra you follow or the technique you are taught. It is the dhyana diksha (initiation into meditation) that the guru gives you. This is the crucial factor. Without the shakti (spiritual power) you cannot do dhyana. Your mind cannot be brought under control. Your own effort, the individual human effort, is not adequate to bring the mind under control. It is the guru’s shakti that enables you. This shakti Swamiji provided. With little effort the mind used to become under control and it used to be flooded with peace. That was the motivating factor to continue the dhyana.
Otherwise, earlier on, one used to sit for dhyana but it was almost a time breaker punishment. You felt you had to do an hour, but agony. There’s nothing. And at the end of it you sometimes got up feeling annoyed and frustrated that why have I sat, what have I gained?
From that time onwards there was always that sense that this period of dhyana I have done is one more step forward in the direction that I am going. You physically felt that you were making progress. It gave you a great deal of mental satisfaction that you were advancing, advancing in a purposeful manner towards the specific goal, which was the important thing.
The 1971 War between India and Pakistan
Before the action in 1971, I had called Swamiji to tell him I was leaving. I wanted His blessings. I couldn’t tell him that we had been mobilized and were leaving for the front. This was all very secret information. I simply told Him that “Swamiji, I am going.”
Swamiji immediately understood that we are going to the front. Swamiji said, “Ashervad [Blessings].” I had my blessing.
Subsequently, when we came back, Swamiji told me that when he had received this call of mine and he understood that we are likely to go to war, he had sat in dhyana. That continued until well after the cease fire with the idea to re-establish peace in the subcontinent.
When we had started off we anticipated that it was going to be a fight to the finish and it may be a very long, drawn out war. In fact, on the 16th itself only I came to know that a cease fire had recently been unilaterally declared by Mrs. Gandhi. We were at that time in the thick of very severe battle and one of my NCO’s who had gone to get a replacement tank for my regiment, he drove up and he told me over the radio that our prime minister declared a unilateral cease fire this evening. That’s how we came to know that a cease fire was in the offing. Otherwise, we couldn’t imagine a cease fire coming in so early. We had geared ourselves, mentally and otherwise, for a long conflict lasting a month or so.
I have no doubt that it was Swamiji’s dhyana or tapas that he sat in that brought about an abrupt end to hostility, that he established peace in the subcontinent.
Lieutenant Colonel Hanut Singh Rathore commanded
the 17 Poona
Horse in the Shakargarh Sector of the Western Front during the 13-day Indo-Pak
war in December 1971. The Indian forces fought some of its toughest
battles in that sector.
On 16th December, his regiment moved into the Basantar river bridgehead and took up positions ahead of the infantry. The enemy launched a number of armored attacks in strength on 16 and 17 December. Undeterred by enemy medium artillery and tank fire, Lt. Col. Hanut Singh moved from one threatened sector to another with utter disregard for his personal safety, inspiring his men to remain steadfast.
Not only was the enemy armor attack repulsed, 48 of their tanks were destroyed. His presence and cool courage inspired his men to remain steadfast and perform commendable acts of gallantry. Throughout this period, Lt. Col. Hanut Singh displayed conspicuous gallantry and leadership in keeping with the best traditions of the Indian Army and was awarded Mahavir Chakra, the second highest decoration for bravery in the Indian armed forces.
Lt. Col. Hanut Singh standing on his Centurion tank, Kooshab.
General Hanut meditated extensively at night while engaged in his duties as an army officer during the day. There is the story from the 1971 war when General Hanut retired to a shed to meditate alone. When he got up, an armed Pakistani soldier, who had been hiding in the shed the entire time, surrendered.
Hanut Singh retired with the rank of Lieutenant General. He is an acclaimed tactician and authority in tank warfare, and is author of the official history of the Indian Armored Corps.
During the Indo-Pak War of 1971, I experienced the supreme benediction of my Guru’s Grace. This is the story.
By about October of 1971, it was evident to even the most
casual observer that the issue of
War is the supreme test of a human being. No one who has not been through battle can ever realize what reserves of mental, moral and physical strength are required to come out successful from such a test. No man can say in advance how he will react to the stresses and strains of battle. I have seen strong men reduced to dithering, blabbering cowards and, conversely, I have seen seemingly mild individuals of unimpressive personality rise to supreme acts of courage and self sacrifice.
Being conscious of such human limitations, I wrote to Shri Swamiji requesting his blessings. The reply came by return post in which Shri Swamiji exhorted me to do my duty without any fear and all would be well. For me, this was the equivalent of the “abhayam” benediction: “When I am by your side, what need is there to fear?” I kept that letter in my wallet where I carry Shri Swamiji’s photograph. Thereafter, I had full faith that come what may we would be victorious. I gave up all anxiety or thought about the future, being fully confident that when the time came I would have my Guru’s Grace and Guidance to rely upon.
It would be of little value to recount here the entire course of the war and all that my Regiment and I did during that war. I will confine myself to recounting incidents where Shri Swamiji’s Grace was so evident that I can only call it Divine intervention.
When we went into battle, I placed the briefcase containing Shri Swamiji’s photograph and other “puja samagiri” on the breech of my tank gun. Whenever we used to fire, I used to remove the photograph and place it underneath the gun. When the action was over and we advanced, I replaced it the photograph on the gun breach. Thus like Partha Sarthi, my Guru also rode with me into battle, always at hand to guide, to counsel and to protect.
The first manifestation of this protective power came on the night of 14th to 15th of December, 1971. We had come up against the enemy’s main defensive system along the general line between Skakaragh and Zafarwal. The enemy defenses were based on a very deep minefield behind which he had over the years constructed seemingly impregnable defenses using concrete pill boxes, anti-tank ditches, and other defense works. However, at that time we were not aware of how strong and forbidding these defenses really were. Realizing that a direct infantry assault would be very costly in casualties, the decision was made to try and break into the enemy defenses with tanks. A very strong force of tanks and armored personnel carriers was placed at my disposal for this purpose, and on the night of December 14 to 15 we set out on our task.
We had never attempted such an action before, particularly at night, and as we pierced through the Pakistani defenses they became bewildered and finally panicked and ran. We came across a number of tanks which the fleeing enemy had abandoned intact, some with engines still running. Encouraged by this initial success, we pressed on. The enemy brought down an intense artillery and other fire in their attempt to stop us but, disregarding all this, we continue pressing forward.
All was going well, or so we thought, until we discovered we
had lost our way! That was understandable because it was a pitch dark night and
the enemy shelling was so heavy and continuous that it was almost impossible to
make out where we were going. However, after about an hour or so we finally
managed to get our bearings and headed again towards the area we had selected
off the map for crossing the
We got stuck barely two to three kilometers from our intended
crossing place. At the time I felt rather dejected because having come so close
to success, we had to abandon what appeared to be a very promising enterprise. However, as daylight advanced and visibility became clear, I realized that had
we continued on our planned course, we would have run into a trap. Unknown to us
in the dark, the Pakistanis had laid a very deep minefield across the route we
were following and on both banks of the
Later when I had more time, I went over the route we followed that night and I discovered that we were moving correctly all along but, just short of the minefield, we turned away at right angles and proceeded parallel to it. Thereafter when we got our correct bearings and attempted to follow our original route again, we got bogged down barely 500 meters short of the minefield and just could not move forward after that. Thereby we were saved from a major disaster and I can only attribute this to the protective Grace of Shri Swamiji.
But after daylight broke on the morning of December 15, it
became apparent to us that in order to establish ourselves across the
By now a critical situation had developed at the bridgehead as the Pakistanis were counter attacking strongly and our infantrymen were fighting desperately to retain their precarious foothold across the Basantar. There were constant appeals by our infantry for our tanks to move up and support them but I was helpless as until the engineers made a safe corridor it would be suicidal to try to negotiate the minefield. Finally, by about 0300 in the morning, the situation in the bridgehead had become desperate and I realized that unless we were able to go to the assistance of our infantry, all may well be lost. Without regard for the consequences, therefore, I ordered the Regiment to advance through the minefield.
Many who met me later asked me how I had accepted such a grave risk. In the army we have a phrase, “taking a calculated risk.” However, normal calculations are based on military factors and had I merely calculated on these factors, I should never have taken such a decision. But my calculations were based on Divine factors, on the protective Grace of Shri Swamiji. And again it was his Grace that saw us through safely that night.
The entire Regiment of tanks passed through the minefield that night without sustaining a single casualty. To emphasize to the layman what this meant, that next morning in broad daylight some other vehicles following the same route deviated very slightly from our tracks and were blown up. We had missed these mines, often by inches, and we had gotten through safely. All who have heard of this subsequently speak of it as a miracle, which indeed it was.
Our arrival in the bridgehead in the nick of time changed the course of the battle in our favor. The Pakistanis were taken aback at being attacked by a regiment of tanks at night. However, they could faintly make out the silhouettes of our tanks and they were firing at us at point blank range, yet they missed us! By comparison, we could not see them at all as they were well dug in. But we fired merely in the general direction where we thought the enemy could be and in many cases secured some startling hits. This unnerved the enemy and they abandoned their defenses and fled.
When we met the Pakistanis after the cease fire, they wanted to know what special devices we had been using to shoot them in the dark. When we told them we had no special devices, they simply would not believe us and to this day they are convinced we had used some sophisticated night fighting devices!
The battle that developed on the next day, December 16, was the fiercest tank versus tank battle that the Indian Army has ever fought. Against my Regiment, the Poona Horse, the Pakistanis hurled a complete armored brigade. They had a superiority of three to one against us and in some sectors a superiority of as much as five to one. But by now every man in our Regiment was filled with an unconquerable spirit because the Regiment’s safe passage and our following successful night attack made all of us realize that we were under the protection of a Divine Power.
I remember that day when the fighting was at its severest that seven of our tanks on either side of me had been hit and were in flames. My second-in-command, Major Ajai Singh, was anxious and he repeatedly told me on the radio to leave my position and move back to a safer location. However, I did not agree to do so, not out of any sense of false bravado but because I felt that any move back at that time might have unfortunate consequences. That apart, in spite of the burning tanks around me, it did not once occur to me that I was in any particular danger. Even the thought of danger did not enter my mind.
It was only later, after the war was over, that I learned of Swamiji’s benediction that “Nothing will happen to my devotees.” This benediction seems to have been conveyed telepathically to me because never once during this entire fighting did any fear or weakness enter my mind. I say all this not to show that I am any braver than the ordinary man. It is to demonstrate the effect of the blessings and Grace of my Guru.
Major Ajai Singh also had an extraordinary manifestation of Shri Swamiji’s protective power. Just after the incident I mentioned above, Ajai’s tank received a direct hit from an enemy tank. Smoke started billowing out of his tank and thinking that their tank was about to catch fire, Ajai and his crew bailed out. However, the tank did not catch fire. It smoldered for some time and then literally broke into a cold sweat. Water began oozing out from all over the tank and dripping inside. Just then Ajai remembered that he had left inside the tank Shri Swamiji’s photograph which he was carrying with him. He went and fetched it and when he opened its cloth wrapper to have darshan, he found that the glass of the frame was cracked right across. It appeared that the force of the terrible blow from the enemy tank shot had been absorbed by Shri Swamiji, saving Ajai and his crew from certain death!
The fighting on December 16 witnessed unparalleled acts of heroism and self sacrifice on the part of the officers and men of the Poona Horse. As the grim and fateful day of the 16th of December, 1971, drew to a close, the gloom of dusk was lighted by the fires of 48 burning enemy tanks, fiery reminders of the grit, intrepidity and desperate valor of all ranks of the regiment. In the course of the fighting we had completely decimated the Pakistani 13th Lancers, their oldest and proudest armored regiment. It had ceased to exist. A second Pakistani regiment, the 31st Cavalry, had been so severely mauled that it could take no further part in the fighting.
The achievements of my Regiment, the Poona Horse, during the Indo-Pak War of 1971 are considered nothing short of miraculous, which indeed they were. Praise, felicitations and decorations for gallantry were showered on the Regiment. But the officers and men of the Poona Horse knew that it was not they who achieved all this. It was the Divine Grace of Shri Shivabalayogi Maharaj that had brought them this success. We were all keen to express our devotion and gratitude to Shri Swamiji in a befitting manner and such an opportunity finally came our way when Shri Swamiji graciously took the trouble of visiting the Regiment in June 1973, thus enabling all the devotees to have his darshan and obtain his personal blessings.
It is important to bear in mind that although India won the war and Bangladesh won its independence, by ending it so quickly, within thirteen days, Shivabalayogi saved many lives on both sides of the conflict.