shirdi sai baba
Shri Sai baba of Shirdi is considered similar to the god by his devotees. Nowadays, we can find lot of small and big temples of Saibaba all over the world. This was happened due to the sincere bhakti and utmost faith kept by the devotees on Saibaba. During his lifetime, Saibaba had performed lot of miracles in the lives of his devotees, healed their diseases, played with the small children like their friends, got angry with the people like a small child, scolded his disciples like their affectionate mother, and hugged his devotees like their dearest father.
Still now, most of the Sai devotees, whenever they receive or if they make any call to anyone over their mobile phones, instead of telling Hello, they used to tell to them, as “SAIRAM”, Good Morning, “SAIRAM”, Good Evening, like that. This shows their sincerity over the Saibaba, and they express their love and affection on Baba in various forms. Some lonely people used to consider Saibaba as their near and dear one, and used to talk in front of his picture. Devotees are also making lot of donations to Shirdi Baba Temple, and the Saibaba Temple located at Shirdi is considered as one of the richest temples in India.
Shirdi is considered as a sacred place for Saibaba devotees, and Saibaba is liked by everyone, irrespective of their caste, creed, community and religion. Though he appeared like a Muslim Fakir, but he participated in the Rama Navami and ShivaRathri festival Celebrations, and after the completion of puja, he himself served the Holy Prasad items on his own hands to the Shirdi people.
CHILDHOOD
It is believed that Shri Sai Baba was a born in the year 1835 to a pious Brahmin couple in Patri village, which was ruled by the then British Government.
At his young age itself, his parents were handed over him to a Muslim fakir, and it is believed that this information was told by baba himself during his final days. But still there are lot of controversies regarding his childhood, and about his date of birth.
LIFE AT SHIRDI
Sri SaiBaba visited Shirdi at age of 16 and as soon as he entered the village, he began to sit under a big Neem tree, and was doing severe meditation on the almighty. The People of Shirdi were very much surprised about the condition of Saibaba, since he was in deep state of meditation for several days even without taking food and water. A pious lady Bayajabai, who was the wife of the village head,felt pity on Saibaba, and she started serving food to Baba like his mother. Saibaba also considered her like his own mother, and he used to tell it to others also. Mahalsapati, the disciplined priest, who served in the Khandoba Temple, considered Saibaba as a holy avatar of Lord Dattatreya, and showed great respect to him.
After meditating under the Neem tree for some years, Baba then began to reside in a mosque. He was visited by many Hindu and Muslim devotees. In the mosque, Baba made the holy fire to burn, and it is called as Dhuni. And Baba used to give the sacred ash to everyone who visits him. Still now, the holy ash acts as a good medicine for all types of health issues.
Due to the significance of Saibaba, more number of his devotees began to visit Shirdi, in order to get his darshan.