New Delhi, April 30, 2008 - The next day, we received a telegram from Mr.Govind Ram, the husband of my elder sister Maina Wanti, who got married to him very recently.

My brother in law, after marriage, had taken his wife i.e. my sister, to Okara to his uncle’s house just for two days for a brief formality of Honey Moon as permissible under the Hindu Culture.

Those days the married couple did not know what Honey Moon was, and they normally did not go out of station after marriage. But the married couple preferred to be at home for some days enjoying their holidays and that used to be their Honey Moon.

Thereafter my brother in law left his wife, i.e. my sister, at our home for a few days since he was to go to Karachi to dispose of  his ancestral property over there and decided to pick her up on his way to Peshawar, his permanent place of residence and business.

We received a telegram from Govind Ram from Karachi that he was coming by the train the same day in the After Noon. My father and brother both of them went to station to receive him leaving me behind to take care of my mother.

However, before leaving for station, my father shifted my mother to the Pooja Room to perform some worship as desired. Before leaving my father in the Pooja Room, he lit the cotton loop of an earthly lamp (dia), which he filled with ghee and kept it before the small table so that my mother could perform her pooja comfortably before dia.

Immediately thereafter they left home for the station to receive my brother in law, and I was made to stay at home with mother. While I was in the Pooja Room with my mother, some one knocked at door and my mother sent me to find out who’s there? I opened the door and found one of my class fellows who had come to meet me to do some consultation about school home work and I took him to my study room, forgetting that my mother was alone in the Pooja Room and she should not have been left unattended.

While my mother was reading the Holy Gita in the Pooja Room, a rate came out of the blue and hit  the burning lamp (dia)  before the small table containing my father’s Holy Gita. This Gita was in Urdu, which my father used to read regularly and that was always kept wrapped in a fancy red kerchief.

However, my mother used to read Gita in Punjabi language and that she was reading.

After the rat hit the lamp, it turned aside and the ghee there from fell on the cloth and that caught fire. My mother noted that the fire could destroy the Holy Gita enveloped by silky kerchief; she tried to move the chair by her hands to extinguish the fire. The fire was minor but it could develop into serious shape. The most important question before my mother was that involved the Holy Gita, which should not be burnt at any cost, what come May.

My mother tried to set her full weight on her front side so as to fall on the table and put out the fire. She tried that way but hit her face by one ornamental piece of the brass kept on both sides of the table. She was hurt by its sharp edge and started crying “Krishna, Krishna, Krishna, snuff out the fire and save the Gita, she meant the Holy Gita in Urdu language belonging to my father, which was kept duly wrapped in the fancy cloth and had started ablaze.

However, my mother by falling on the table, managed to quench the fire to prevent its spreading; the smoke was coming out of it with minor sparking constituents. However, she completely fell on the ground helpless, being weak, frail and feeble. She tried to get up but failed.  Ultimately, she cried for me but I could not hear her being a bit hard of hearing but my class mate heard her voice and alerted me about my mother’s calling voice.

My class fellow and me, both of us, were taken aback to see my mother helplessly fallen on the ground. We swiftly extinguished the fire and then ran to the clinic of the doctor living adjacent to us; his clinic was on the ground floor and residence on the first storey. The doctor was not available, there was none else in the clinic except their servant whom we brought with us and he arranged an ambulance and we carried mother to the main city hospital    where she was admitted but in between she   lost her consciousness.

Those days’ telephones had only land lines for the public, there were no cell phones. I couldn’t contact my father and brother immediately, who had gone to station to receive my brother in law. My elder sister along with my younger sister had gone for some shopping with our neighbor aunt since my brother in law was to come and my sister wanted some extra shopping.

I pasted a chit on the house that father or sister should contact me at the main hospital.  On reaching home, my father along with brother and my brother in law all reached the hospital.

When their arrival at the hospital, I explained the whole situation to my father but they were not satisfied. They wanted to contact the doctor, who was immediately not available. The nurse was not able to explain what exactly that was, whether that was coma or temporary unconsciousness. They were waiting anxiously for the doctor but he came late after inspecting the other wards.

The doctor was an English man, who had come on some deputation along with a small group of British doctors. When my mother was brought in the Emergency Ward of the hospital, he was the only senior doctor who had first examined my mother and admitted her to hospital and put her on some observation.

The doctor briefed my father about the state of my mother. He said, words to the effect, “She is in a state of unconsciousness, her brain looks to be progressively depressed but the vital activities of the brain respiration and constriction of the heart continue. She is required to remain admitted in the hospital at least for 48 hours for us to diagnose whether she had gone to coma or just unconsciousness.”

We were not allowed to stay with the patient and the doctor asked us to go home and to come next morning any time carrying the admission pass.

All of us came home, and felt missing mother’s presence. My brother in law told that he would extend his stay in Montgomery till she regained her normal state.

Next day, my father, first prayed to Lord Vishnu in the Pooja Room and then went to hospital very early morning, probably due to over anxiety. Since only one person could go to hospital on one entry pass, no one else accompanied him. When my father reached the Emergency Ward to see my mother, kept for observation, was shocked not to find her there.

He asked the nurses, but they said due to duty change, they had no proper knowledge what happened. My father ran towards the reception, but there was no information. Ultimately he found one doctor whom he asked but he also denied having any knowledge about her and advised him to wait till the doctors come hospital for their routine rounds.

While being disappointed, my father was slowly walking in the hospital putting his head down, sinking and thinking that he had come too early and there was none to solve his query. He being a holy man and devotee of Lord Vishnu was chanting ‘Om Namo Bhagvate Vasudevaye’ the mantra of Lord Krishna, considered to be full fledged incarnation of Lord Vishnu.

Some slight noise from one side of the hospital attracted the attention of my father; he observed a gathering of a few persons standing at a small temple erected in the hospital for the relatives of patients for offering prayers for the speedy recovery of the patients or patients themselves.

The hospital had two idols, one of Lord Vishnu, and the other was of Lord Krishna, where a Poojari (Priest) was also present distributing Prasadam to the relatives of patients. My father came closer to the temple, paid reverence to Lord Vishnu and asked within, “Where is my wife Bhagwan?” There was no answer.

Finally my father went to the ward where from the discharge slips of the patients were issued.  He was given to understand that there was no record of her discharge from the hospital, and as per their record she should definitely be in some ward of the hospital. Since my father was a bit over anxious to know about her, his nervousness was rising.

My father himself realized that he had come to hospital much early and should better go out and came again after about one and a half hour and by the time the doctors would also come on their inspection rounds.

My brother and I came to hospital to find our father, to our surprise our father was coming from the hospital.  He was surprised to see us and asked how had they come?

My brother explained to father that the European Doctor of this hospital had brought mother home by an ambulance and that’s waiting at our home. “Hurry up, they’re waiting for you.”

We hired a tonga (Horse Carriage) and reached home just within 15 minutes. We carried our father to the Drawing Room which was on the right side of the House.

My father was surprised to see my mother sitting on the Sofa and the Doctor was also sitting on the adjacent sofa chair. When my father came closer to my mother, she stood up like a normal lady, touched his feet and burst into tears. She did not leave the feet at least for a minute. My father was astonished to see all that, he first thought he was having a dream but later on realized that was a reality.
 
The doctor told my father as under, words to the effect:

 “Your wife had undergone a terrible shock; she thought the Holy Gita was probably burnt in fire and she fell lifeless and went into a serious state of unconsciousness, and that thought continued worrying her in the state of coma. Suddenly she got up this morning at around 5’O clock and started behaving like a mad woman shouting: “Krishna, your Gita is burnt, I couldn’t prevent.” And she was repeating it.”

The doctor continued: “The staff immediately telephoned me and I rushed to hospital to see this typical case since it was under my observation. On reaching there, I realized that was a case beyond medical explanation, perhaps of a Devotee and God.”

“The nurse described to me some brief history while admitting her in the hospital. She also helped the doctor by explaining the situation that led to her coma.”

The doctor continued, “I then decided to bring her here by ambulance to find out the background, since such cases are rare and help us in treating future likewise cases and help in our medical research.”

“When I brought her to the Pooja Room with the help of your family members, she at once picked up the Holy Gita, which escaped burning and fell on the ground unconscious and that made us worried. I checked her with my stethoscope, everything looked to be normal. I decided to wait to see the reaction for a few minutes.

“Meanwhile she regained her consciousness and realized that the Gita was not burnt due to her efforts that she made, and ultimately got the blessing of God to gain recovery from a long deadly disease by struggling in the state of coma, which happens one in million. She had come out of the disease completely and suddenly, unbelievable in the medical history.”

The doctor concluded with exclamation:

 “Such cases are beyond our medical history but they do occur, call it a miracle or God’s Blessings, no one is sure how it works, but it does work, it is not a matte of chance, and it is practically before us. In God's field, normally the established authorities go wrong in assessing why such a state occurs,  the spiritualism prevails over it. We lay our arms where it is a case of a Devotee and God, and now I seek leave of you.” And he departed. He asked someone to come along with me to collect the discharge slip.

Continued…..