MY MOTHER - MO

 MY MOTHER - MO

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By Priya Nath Mehta

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Today, August 5, 1967, was the day when my mother,Smt Savitri Devi Mahamateshwari, left this physical world and mingled into the eternity of her eternal self. She had lived with my father, HH Shri Bhola Nathji, for 28 years.

I, and my elder brother, Pran Nath Mehta, called our mother MO out of love. The word "Mom'" was not in use at that time and in India people called their mothers MAA or MATAJI.

From my childhood days I had this premonition that one day I was going to lose my dearest , most beloved Mo. I would follow her around from room to room, in our large house, as if she was going to disappear and I would never find her.

I saw a Hindi Film that made me weep for days. It showed a little child rocking her empty cradle with her late mother's photograph on the wall, singing:

"Maa, pyaari maa

Bhoole na jhoole ke din"

"O Mother, Dearest Mother,

Never shall I forget those days of the cradle"

My father knew everything that was going to happen in the years to come. We all looked upon him as God, as if this knowledge was born with us. He looked after my mother like no husband in the world ever looked after his wife.

But I, being the youngest, was the most affectionate of all towards my mother, and would shut her harmonium closed, if I ever found her singing a sad bhajan or ghazal.

Just before I leff for Harvard University in America, I purchased two sarees for my mother and she said to me:

"Priya, don't love me so much, or I will cry after you are gone!"

The day came when I went to Harvard from London. As the plane rose high in the sky I looked at the airport below and saw my parents standing there. I felt as if I was leaving behind everything and going towards nothing.

The fateful day came at Harvard four years later, when I heard the words of a nurse from Royal Free Hospital, London, say to me: "Mr. Mehta your mother is very very ill! She has acute kidney failure!"

I left behind everything at Harvard. A bridge of helping hands appeared to help me everywhere. All my professors and friends at Harvard were very sympathetic and helpful.

At New York Airport the last flight to London was about to leave but there was a long queue of people ahead of me. Word quickly spread "His mother is ill!" and before I knew it, all the people in the queue moved aside and allowed me to the front, and very soon I was on the flight to London.

When I reached the dismal flat in which my parents and brother lived, I found my mother looking as if she were 80 years old, even though she was only 51 at the time.

My mother embraced me and said: "Priya !You have come! This happiness shall remain with me till the end!" And she closed her eyes just then, forever.

The funeral was carried out By Leverton and Co. Carried on the shoulders of tall Englishmen pall bearers was my mother's coffin. My father too applied his shoulder. We were inside a Hindu Temple where the electric crematorium was also located.

Mr. Leverton tried to take a last picture with his camera of my mother's uncovered face. But the skies were overcast with dark clouds. Just then the clouds parted and the rays of the sun entered the skylight of the Temple and fell straight on my mother's face!

Mr. Leverton said: "It was heavenly light!"

The return to India was filled with sadness and the saddest part was where we consigned her ashes to the Ganges. It was as if I was never going to see my mother again. She had now become a part of the land she loved so much.

As the Ganges carried her ashes away I heard her song come from the waters:

"Prabhu mere sharan teri main aayaa.."

"O Lord! I have taken refuge in Thee..."

I remembered my father's words:

"Everything in this world is perishable except Love."

COPYRIGHT

PRIYA NATH MEHTA

SON OF

HH SMT. SAVITRI DEVI MAHAMATESHWARI

HH SHRI BHOLA NATHJI