Swami Chidananda Saraswati

Swami Chidananda Saraswati is famously known in India as a jnani, yogi and spiritual leader. He also succeeded the President"s position in the Divine Life Society at Rishikesh in the year 1963, after his predecessor Swami Sivananda died. Swami Sivananda was the founder of the Divine Life Society.

Early life of Swami Chidananda Saraswati was filled with love for service to the needy and inclination towards spiritualism. He was born to Srinivasa Rao and Sarojini on the 24th of September, 1916. He was the second among the five children and the eldest son of the family. His father, Sri Srinivasa Rao was a wealthy Zamindar who possessed lots of villages, extensive lands and buildings in south India. His mother Sarojini was an ideal woman, reputed for her saintliness. At the age of eight, the life of Sridhar Rao (as Swami Chidananda was called before he became a sanyasi) was shaped by Sri Anantayya, a friend of his grandfather, who narrated him stories from the great epics of Mahabharata and Ramayana.

Swami Chidananda`s ideals from his childhood were to perform Tapas (austerities), become a Rishi or sage, and possess a vision of the Lord which he cherished. Krishna Rao, his uncle, saved him from the bad influences of the mundane world, and fired in him the desire of the Nivritti or life of renunciation, which Chidananda happily nurtured until it flowered into sainthood.

The elementary education of Sridhar was started at Mangalore. In the year 1932, he got admitted in the Muthiah Chetty School in the city of Chennai where he proved to be a brilliant student and became the favourite of all. His personality, code of conduct and extraordinary attributes gave him a special place in the heart and soul of all the students and teachers who were in contact with him. In the year 1936, he got admission to the Loyola College, and in 1938, he secured the Bachelor of Arts degree.

Swami Chidananda Saraswati`s family was reputed for its high code of conduct which was imbibed by him from his early childhood. Charity and service were the main virtues of all the members of his family and these virtues of nobility found a perfect shape in the life of Sridhar Rao. He discovered several ways to demonstrate them. Sridhar seldom refused to offer help to anyone who asked for it. He gave away freely to the poor and the needy. Early in life, although he was born in a wealthy family, he denounced the pleasures of the physical world and devoted himself entirely to contemplation and seclusion. He studied spiritual books which appealed him the most, even more than his college books. The works of Swami Vivekananda, Ramakrishna, Mahatma Gandhi, and Swami Sivananda Saraswati took much priority over all others.

Swami Chidananda shared his wisdom with others so much that he almost became the Guru of the household and of the neighborhood, with whom he would talk of honesty, purity, devotion, love and service to God. He would press them to do Japa or chanting of the name of Rama. While in his twenties, Swamiji began instigating youngsters into this famous Rama Taraka Mantra. He was a great admirer of Sri Ramakrishna Math at Chennai and on a regular basis participated in the Satsangs there. Swami Vivekananda`s call to renounce reverberated within Swami Chidananda`s pure heart. He always desired for the Darshan or vision of Sadhus and saints who visited the metropolis.

Works of Swami Chidananda Saraswati in the form of service to the needy are outstanding. Determined to become a guru from his early childhood, Swami Chidananda went much farther to achieve a higher platform in life. Swami Chidananda Saraswati undertook a number of social duties relentlessly. He passed away for the heavenly abode ob the 28th of August 2008. Swamiji served the lepers without any type of hatred. He used to make huts on the large lawns of his house and took care of them as though they were deities. Later, when he joined the Ashram his early desire to help the lepers found complete and free expression. Patients from nearby areas, suffering from the worst type of diseases came to him. He believed that the patients were none other than Lord Narayana and thus served the patients with tender love and compassion.

Despite his multifarious activities and Sadhana, Sridhar founded under the guidance of Gurudev, the Yoga Museum in the year 1947, in which the whole Vedanta philosophy and the entire process of Yoga Sadhana are portrayed in the form of pictures and illustrations. By the end of the year 1948, Gurudev made him The Divine Life Society`s General Secretary. The responsibility of the whole organization came over his shoulders and from then on he spiritualized each of his activities by his wise leadership, presence and counsel. He cheered all to heighten their consciousness up to the level of the Divine. He was made a Sanyasi by his guru, Swami Sivananda Saraswati, on the auspicious day of Guru Purnima, on the 10th of July, 1949. Henceforth he got his monastic name as Swami Chidananda, meaning a renunciate having the highest consciousness and bliss.

In the month of November 1959, Swami Chidananda undertook an extensive tour of America, sent by Gurudev as his personal representative to spread the message of Divine Life and he returned in the month of March 1962. Again in the month of August 1963, after the Mahasamadhi of his Guru, Swami Chidananda was elected the Divine Life Society`s President. He then strove to hold up the banner of renunciation, devoted service, spiritual idealism and love, not only inside the set-up of the vast organization of the Society, but in the hearts of numbers seekers all over the world, who were much eager to get his help, advice and guidance.

Swami Chidananda toured all over India, South Africa and Malaysia to serve the devotees of the Society and in the year 1968, he undertook the Global Tour because of the request from several devotees and disciples of his holy Master Sri Swami Sivanandaji Maharaj and toured all countries of the world. He was greeted cordially and was listened with rapt attention wherever he went. Swamiji, right from the beginning, worked and served the Divine Cause of the Mission of Gurudev tirelessly and spread his Divine Life Message all over not only in India but in abroad.

Swami Chidananda Saraswati wrote a number of books which include An Instrument of thy Peace, Bhaja Govindam, Awake, Realise your Divinity, Bliss is Within, New Beginning, Message of Swami Chidananda to Mankind, Light on the Yoga Way of Life, Verses Addressed to the Mind, Practical Guide to Yoga, Ultimate Journey, Guide to Noble Living, Ponder These Truths, Lectures on Raja Yoga, Path Beyond Sorrow, Philosophy, Psychology and Practice of Yoga, Path to Blessedness, The Role of Celibacy in Spiritual Life, Liberation is Possible, The Truth That Liberates, Ultimate Journey, Twenty Important Spiritual Instructions, Twenty Important Spiritual Instructions, Guide Lines to Illumination, The Role of Celibacy in Spiritual Life, Verses Addressed to the Mind, The Truth That Liberates and a number of other books.

Swami Chidananda Saraswati received several awards for his role as spiritual leader as well as for his unparalleled humanitarian work. Few of his several awards include;
•The title of Patron of the Russian Indian Heritage Research Foundation, Moscow
•The title of a Patron of the Centre for Religious Experience in Oxford, United Kingdom
•The title of a Patron of the International Naturopathy Organization
•The title of a Patron of the Bapu Nature Cure Hospital in Delhi

Harmony, unity and the faith in infinite paths to reach God are the basics of the religion of Pujya Swamiji. His aim was to get all closer to God, irrespective of what name one uses. Swami Chidananda became a leader in several international, inter-faith conferences and parliaments, which also includes;
•The Parliament of World Religions in Chicago held in the year 1993
•The Parliament of World Religions held in Capetown, South Africa in the year 1999
•The Millennium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders held at the United Nations in the year 2000
•The World Economic Forum in New York in the year 2002
•The World Council of Religious Leaders held at the United Nations in Bangkok in the year 2002
•The World Conference of Religions for Peace organized in Kyoto, Japan in the year 2006
•The Global Youth Peace Summit at the United Nations held in New York in the month of October 2006

He received the Mahatma Gandhi Humanitarian award from the Mayor of New Jersey, USA for his great interfaith and charitable work. He also received the Best Citizens of India Award. The Diwaliben Mohanlal Mehta Charitable Trust Award for Progress in Religion and National Integration Award are also held by Swamiji.