First-person testimony · Part III

Ramgiri Bua (Bapugirbuva)

Context

Ramgirbuva — whom Baba called Bapugirbuva — is the messenger at the heart of the Jamner Miracle (Chapter 33). About 1904-05, when Mamlatdar Nanasaheb Chandorkar's daughter Mainatai was in obstructed labour at Jamner (100 miles from Shirdi), Baba sent Ramgirbuva with Udi and the Madhav Adkar Arati written out by Shama. Ramgirbuva had only Rs. 2 — barely the train fare to Jalgaon. Baba said simply: "God will give." Reaching Jalgaon at 2:45 a.m. with two annas, Ramgirbuva was in difficulty. About 3 a.m. a peon in boots, turban, and full livery came up calling "Who is Bapugirbuva of Shirdi?" — led him to an excellent tanga and pair of horses. They drove. At dawn at a brooklet the driver watered the horses; the peon offered refreshments (Ramgirbuva, fearing the livery indicated a Moslem, was assured the peon was a Garhwali Kshatriya). At Jamner Ramgirbuva alighted briefly for a call of nature — and on returning the tanga, driver, and peon were gone. He went to Nanasaheb's house, delivered the Udi and Arati. Mainatai's delivery was safe within minutes. Nanasaheb had sent no peon.

About the 1936 statement

Ramgirbuva's own 1936 statement (dated 1 December 1936, page 278 of Part III) is one of the three witness affidavits that document the Jamner Miracle. The Satcharitra quotes from it directly in Chapter 33: "At about 3 a.m. a peon in boots, turban and well equipped with other details of good dress came to me… By the time I attended my call of nature the tanga and its driver had disappeared."

Verbatim excerpt from Narasimha Swami (1940s)

sion. Baba himself broached the subject of going to Pandharpur and asked her when she was hoping to start. Then Baba gave my wife and mother Darshan of himself as Vithoba and Rukmai, at Shirdi Masjid. They were highly pleased and did not want to go to Pandharpur. He often asked her afterwards when she would go to Pandharpur. She always replied thereafter that her God was there at Shirdi which was her Pandharpur*. When my wife was ill once be fore her delivery, Baba appeared in a dream and applied udhi and she got up and cried, “Baba is come and applying Udhi fresh and hot from the Dhuni. My body is burning. So get up.” She got alright. Like this, Baba has appeared several times. When in great difficulty, I always cried before his picture at home and he would then appear before me at once and comfort me. Nana SC told me of Baba’s sending a man with Udhi to help his daughter in her delivery in ill health at jamner; that a tongawalla and horses not sent by him fetched the messenger and disappeared. That messenger is a Ramgir Gosavi still alive at Shirdi. Baba used to call him Babugir. Nana’s two sons, Babu and Bapu, are at Kalyan in Chandorkar wada, Kalyan.

Source: B. V. Narasimha Swami, Devotees' Experiences of Sri Sai Baba (All India Sai Samaj, Madras, 1940s; reprint Akhanda Sainama Sapthaha Samithi, Hyderabad). PDF on Internet Archive · OCR full text. Excerpt matched on the term: Ramgir Gosavi. This is the canonical English excerpt; please consult the original PDF for context.