SWAMI RAMDAS (1884 to 1963)

Swami Ramdas, known as Vittal Rao in his pre-Sannyas days, was leading an ordinary householder’s life till God's grace descended on him in or about the year 1920. Then he was made to think deeply on the futility of worldly pursuits and the absolute necessity of pursuing the divine path for realising his identity with the Supreme Being, as a result of which alone he can get 'Peace-eternal.'

He placed himself totally at the altar of God. At this time his father initiated him with the holy and all-powerful Name of God—RAM MANTRA. Prompting came from within to renounce the worldly life and he took to a wandering mendicant's life. Intense aspiration coupled with intense practice to attain the Highest quickened his spiritual progress and in a short time he had the vision of beholding his Beloved God everywhere, both within and without. This resulted in getting himself established in unending Bliss.

Having thus attained spiritual liberation and God-vision, he started his mission to guide and serve mankind in order to awaken it to the awareness of God through the founding of Anandashram. Thousands of devotees both from India and abroad took advantage of his most enlightening and inspiring presence till he dropped his mortal coil in 1963.

H.H. Swami Sivanandaji, a great saint, who established the widely known DIVINE LIFE SOCIETY in Rishikesh, Himalayas, described Beloved Papa in these words:-

"The Supreme Being is the veritable quintessence of inexpressible, indescribable BLISS. Bliss is irresistible. Bliss is infectious. Swami Ramdas is a personification of such bliss transcendent. To experience Universal or Cosmic Consciousness is to be merged in a limitless sea of bliss. Ramdas is the living example of one that has realized Cosmic Consciousness. Thus he is permeated with bliss. All his actions, utterances and his writings bubble with this bliss. His life is now a practical demonstration of the scriptural description about the blissful, care-free and unconcerned activity of a Jivanmuktha. His picturesque and chequered earlier life, his enterprising, daring and reckless later Nivrithi life and his grand, sublime and joyous state today, are all proofs positive of the declarations of the great scriptures."