VMPL
Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], September 25: Eleven young, highly educated devotees from different corners of the world will take Atmarpit Diksha, a lifelong vow of celibacy and service, in Mumbai this Saturday. The ceremony will be one of the central moments of 'Aho Gurudev', the celebration of the 60th birthday of Pujya Gurudevshri Rakeshji, founder of Shrimad Rajchandra Mission Dharampur (SRMD).
The two-day celebration will be held at the Jio World Convention Centre on September 25 and 26. According to the organisers, thousands from nearly 23 countries are expected at each of its three sessions.
The gathering is set to bring together spiritual leaders from different traditions, including Morari Bapu, Anandmurti Gurumaa, Swami Swaroopanandaji, Swami Chidanand Saraswati Maharaj, Sister Shivani from Brahma Kumari, Sadhvi Bhagawati Saraswati and Bhikkhu Sanghasenaji. Also in attendance will be industrialists and dignitaries from different fields.
A three-session programme
The celebrations will open on Friday evening, September 25, with a 60th-year curtain raiser. At this session, the Mission will unveil 60 landmark initiatives, 30 spiritual and 30 in seva (service). Among them are two nationwide health campaigns: Vision Care will provide free eye check-ups and spectacles, and Anaemia-Mukt Bharat will focus on diagnosis, awareness and mitigation of anaemia.
The morning of Saturday, September 26, which is Gurudevshri's birthday, will open with a 'Symphony of Global Wishes' where devotees from across six continents will express their heartfelt wishes, followed by the Atmarpit Diksha ceremony and a tribute by the Mission’s Vice President Atmarpit Nemiji.
The closing evening will present a cultural tribute to his life. The production has been scripted and performed entirely by around 600 devotees and uses LED projections. The evening will also see the worldwide release of a commemorative coffee-table book and wishes from saints and achievers. In each of the sessions, there will be a discourse by Gurudevshri and speeches by dignitaries
From scholar to spiritual guide
Born in Mumbai on September 26, 1966, to Rekhaben and Dilipbhai Jhaveri, Gurudevshri is said by the Mission to have begun meditating for hours at the age of four. He earned an M.A. in Philosophy with a gold medal and later wrote a doctoral treatise running past 3,000 pages on Shri Atmasiddhi Shastra by Shrimad Rajchandraji, the 19th-century Jain philosopher regarded as a spiritual guide to Mahatma Gandhi. The University of Mumbai conferred the doctorate in 1998.
He founded the organisation in 1994 and established its ashram at Dharampur in south Gujarat in 2001, which now serves as the Mission’s International Headquarters. The Mission now operates 136 centres across six continents.
Service at scale
The Mission says its work has touched over 42 million lives globally. Its healthcare initiatives have treated 16.4 million rural people. Its Dharampur hospital performs paediatric open-heart surgeries and runs a District Early Intervention Centre that has treated over 1.1 million children. Its education programmes have reached more than 3.4 million students, and it has tended to over five lakh animals. Its Mission Africa programme spans 16 countries and has touched over five million lives, including 70,000 children fed daily, leading to a 95 per cent rise in school attendance.
The Mumbai celebration marks the start of a year-long calendar of events across cities in India and abroad.
About Shrimad Rajchandra Mission Dharampur
Shrimad Rajchandra Mission Dharampur is a global spiritual movement founded in 1994 by Pujya Gurudevshri Rakeshji, guided by the principle "Realise one's true self and serve others selflessly." Through its humanitarian arm, Shrimad Rajchandra Love and Care, which holds Special Consultative Status with the UN Economic and Social Council, the Mission runs programmes in health care, education care, child care, women's care, tribal care, community care, humanitarian care, animal care, environmental care, and emergency relief care.
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