Pratiksha Apurv remembers her sannyas darshan and creating her own, first ‘kids’ mala’.
I vividly remember my first trip to the Pune Ashram with my grandparents (Osho’s parents).
It was October 1975. For an 11-year old kid, it was a doorway to an absolutely new world. My days were surreal and I used to look forward to Evening Darshan with Osho. It had a very fascinating pattern. Before taking his chair after entering the hall, Osho used to touch his father’s and then his mother’s feet. In that chain, my number was third. The moment Osho sat in his chair, my routine was to walk up to him and touch his feet.
That’s where I learnt to sit in utter silence, drinking nectar from the source. I don’t remember the sequence on that 18th October but I can recall very clearly that after touching Osho’s feet, I didn’t return to my seat but rather told him that I wanted to take sannyas.
Imagine an 11-year-old saying this to her uncle (Bade Papa) and that too when no one else in the family had yet taken sannyas. Osho smiled and very lovingly asked, “Have you asked your mom about it?”
I spontaneously replied, “When you are here why do I need to ask my mom about it?”
He smiled again and gave me the ‘maala’. He didn’t change my name because he had already given me my name at the time of birth.
After a brief pause, I bent to touch his feet, and since it was a normal mala for grown-up sannyasins, it hit the floor and made a sound. Osho noticed that and told Laxmi (Osho’s then secretary) to take me to the Mala Shop the next day and get a mala designed from me, especially for kids.
The following day was eventful, too. I went to the Mala Shop with Ma Laxmi, and designed my own mala. When I look back, I feel Osho knew that one day I will become a designer and then an artist… The Mala Shop was perhaps my apprenticeship? Interestingly, the mala that I designed later became the standard mala for children taking sannyas.
From a post on Facebook, dated 18 October 2021
#osho #sannyas #sannyasday #pratikshaapurv
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