Life Sketch Life Sketch
Garbeta is a small out-of-the-way village tucked away in the sprawling district of West Midnapore in West Bengal. Here did Ma-Mahajnan-the Transcendent Mother-make her first appearance in the world. She was the thirteenth and the youngest child in the family. While she was still a child, she lost her father. After his death, his helpless widow Sumadhuri Debi faced a grim future. She had to rear a big hungry family all by herself.So Mother had a taste of hardship very early in life. She was in rags. She went hungry. She had to meet with cruel and harsh treatment. People were not always kind and sympathetic.
She, however, was always cheerful. She felt for others and shared in their joys and sorrows. She was helpful to the neighbors often doing their household chores for them.She was a good talker and loved company. All this kept her happy and contented. In those days, early marriage was the rule, particularly in the countryside. If a girl remained unmarried in her teens, her family would come under a social stigma. She reached the age of thirteen.
To her mother’s great relief, a husband was at least found for her. She got married. She became a prisoner of domestic life. But her spirit was as free as ever. She, indeed , did not shirk her duties and responsibilities as a chaste and devoted Hindu wife. But her life thereafter was a remarkable adventure of spirit, a long-drawn experiment with the truth. She remained true to the “kindred points of heaven and home”.
Her first child was born when she was nineteen. Two other children were born at four years’ intervals. It speaks of her remarkable strength of character that in later life she sacrificed her first-born for the sake of her high regard for principles.
Mother is now seventy six. She presides over a large, bustling household consisting of son, daughter-in-law, daughter, son-in-law and a number of grand-children. She works without allowing herself any rest.
‘Ma-Mahajnan’ did not have any formal education. Unfamiliar with book-lore, she had all her education in the great school of life and nature. She has an intuitive grasp of the eternal verities in the domain of spirit. In her flashes of inspiration, she solves on the spot many a problem of life and conduct, which people around her bring to her notice. She talks extempore sometimes breaking into songs. Her spoken words have been tape-recorded and later published running into more than one hundred fair-sized volumes.