Satguru Mangat Ram Ji- An Introduction

India is and has been a land of great rishis, seers and saints for time immemorial and Shri Satguru Mangat Ramji stands in this great tradition linking the past with our present, and with the future of our mankind. His life was one of continuous meditation, his penance refined and selfless beyond belief. He was born on 24 November, 1903, at a village Gangothian Brahmana of Rawalpindi district, now in Pakistan. He was an unusual child and seemed far too serious for his age. He lost his father when just four years old and his mother Ganeshi Devi thereafter looked after him with full care and concern.Mangat preferred to stay alert in the meditative stance well past into midnight rather than to sleep, from on early age itself. He attained self-reliasation at the age of thirteen only. He was an embodiment of simplicity, humility and intellectual excellence with complete dedication to meditation. He was good at studies and was personally offered a scholarship by his headmaster not only to complete his high school but right upto post-gradutation. Mangat, however, consciously renounced a formal education at this point of his life. This seemed to him to be too self-sentered. As he said of himself later, "This one's concern was with the knowledge that alone could benefit the ignorants of the world".He took up a job at the behest of his mother but gave it up when she died. He remained in service of his mother till her death in March 1928 and felt released from his final domestic responsibilities. He remained a bachelor and a true Brahmchari throughout his life and led an ascetic life of intense unremitting contemplation. However, from this point on there was no looking back.He spent most of his time in meditation in high altitudes areas, dense forests and other lonely spots. Open sky remained his night companion for life. A wandering "faqir" with no possessions but a love of God; his living was startingly simple. For years at a stretch, he sustained himself on a single glass of milk tea per day. He overcame sleep, hunger and thrust.The reveletory verses of the "vani" welled-up from the depth of his "Samadhi" and apilled over for hours on end. Bhagat Banaras Das who served at the master's feet for 17 years collected as many of these as he could and compiled them into "Granth Shri Samta Prakash".The prose sayings on questions of applied "Dharma" and the way to right living are conserved in the "Granth Shri Samta Vilas". Revelations and doctrine converged an a single focus : Samta - the point where differences and duality vanish, the state wherein the mind assendsthe word of senses, and where phenomenon entities and experiences disappear and the individual being merges into the Supreme Being leaving behind the limits of time and space.He preached what he practised on himself. He was an embodiment of exquisite humility, undaunted fearlessness and an undesiring state of mind, a true example of selflessness. He left his mortal remains on 4 Februrary 1954 at the young age of 50 years at Tarantaran in Punjab(North India).He was the greatest exponent of Samta which he discribed copiously in the two "Granths" mentioned above. These scriptures are an ocean of spiritual knowledge for seekers of Truth or Ultimate Reality.