CHAKRAVARTI: Thank you.
MISHLOVE: It's a pleasure to be with you. Your work is very unsuual for many, many reasons. I think it's fair to say that in talking about spiritual healing as it expresses itself through you, we're dealing with a very unique situation, and perhaps it would be useful to begin at the beginning, if you could talk a little bit about how you first discovered that you had healing abilities.
CHAKRAVARTI: The thing is that it so happened that in the year 1962 I lost my father, and just before his death, two days before his death, he told me that I will be known all over the world. I was just a housewife, and I was quite sick also. I couldn't understand. Then after his death I got such a shock, and I think then it came to the surface, though I couldn't start my work then, because my husband was in military intelligence, and I being sick it was not possible, but somehow after his death something took over me. I could understand that I was changing inside -- not physically, but mentally, I was changing. I became aware of this gift then only.
MISHLOVE: And it manifested itself as a vibration.
CHAKRAVARTI: At that stage, if I ever saw a sick person, I just wanted to touch that person, without rhyme or reason. It was such a strong urge. I felt if I touched the person it would become better. In that process I came to know -- I was myself sick -- I came to know a group of people doing the laying on of hands.
MISHLOVE: Laying on of hands.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes. And I joined them, to get rid of my problem. There actually I became aware of my gifts, because they couldn't help me, but there, after joining them, I found there is a subtle vibration in my right hand which can detect the problem.
MISHLOVE: A subtle vibration in your right hand.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes.
MISHLOVE: That could detect the problem.
CHAKRAVARTI: Automatically it goes to the cause of the problem, not the effect.
MISHLOVE: Right to the cause.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, yes, yes.
MISHLOVE: I know you mean this in a very literal way. Your hand will move.
CHAKRAVARTI: Move all over the body, and it will go and start maximum vibration at the point where really the disease originated.
MISHLOVE: So your hand is actually vibrating, physically moving.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, yes, yes.
MISHLOVE: That's really quite unusual.
CHAKRAVARTI: And I don't have any control on that. If I try to stop it, it gives me some sort of pain in my chest.
MISHLOVE: So you felt compelled, as it were, to pursue --
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, that is something, though there was lots of problems. My husband never wanted me to do this, being a sick person.
MISHLOVE: Being a sick person, and I suppose a traditional housewife.
CHAKRAVARTI: A housewife, you know. Then I was exposed to the outer world, which he never wanted. But there was some compulsion. With so much problem around me, I had to do this work.
MISHLOVE: At the same time, you were also exposing yourself, I guess it would be fair to say, to the influence of one of the saints of India, Sai Baba of Shirdi.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes. It so happened that before my father's death I came to know of him, and somehow I felt that -- I don't know why -- I felt that he is really guiding me or something. I became too much attached to him.
MISHLOVE: To Sai Baba.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes.
MISHLOVE: I think, for the benefit of people who are listening, can we talk a little bit about the history of Sai Baba of Shirdi. Many people, I think, have heard of Sathya Sai Baba; many people think of him as the heir of Sai Baba of Shirdi. You're shaking your head no.
CHAKRAVARTI: Because I think that his work is very different. He was a fakir, you know. He had nothing. Whatever people would give him, by the evening he would give it away. He was living a very simple life, and he didn't believe in any religion. To the Muslim people who came to him, he would take the name of Lord Rama, a Hindu word. And when the Hindus went to him, he would take the name of Allah -- as if he were saying, "There is no such thing as God as such; no. Whatever name you may call, whatever religion, there is nothing to do." I from my childhood also believed in that way.
MISHLOVE: Believed that God transcends --
CHAKRAVARTI: God is beyond all this. Water -- the name you call the water, it remains water. Your father, you may be calling him different words. Somebody else will call in their language, no? But that doesn't mean the relationship is there. So that is my way of thinking.
MISHLOVE: I suppose you were already getting in touch with -- for lack of a better word I might say an energy that --
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, I feel that, because he helps me, I feel. Then people are saying there is some figure standing behind me. It was in Beirut. So people think that really he works through me, but to tell you the truth I don't know.
MISHLOVE: You mentioned Beirut, because your healing abilities, working just as a housewife in Delhi, had become so famous that you had been invited to travel all over Asia and eventually all over the world. In this process there were psychic people who said that they saw this figure behind you.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, that's right.
MISHLOVE: Manifesting. And you yourself believe that it's the influence of --
CHAKRAVARTI: I think, because I love him very much, and I feel -- because there was somebody who was a psychic man, and when I was doing this work in the Syrian Embassy --
MISHLOVE: In the Syrian Embassy in Delhi.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, in Dehli. There was a man, a very famous man from France. While I was working he saw him behind me, and he told me, "I saw; who is working through you?" I said, "Nobody." He said, "Somebody is behind you." So I got frightened and looked back. I said, "No, nobody's there." Then I said, "Yes, people say that there is a saint who works through me." So he said, "I have got a message from him to you; you finish your work, then I'll tell you. So he told me the name, but he pronounced it a little wrongly, you know. At that time I was working every day, because my husband was in military intelligence and didn't believe. So I was miserable, because everybody except my husband -- I was working, and he used to get angry with me. He said, "One day you will fall dead. This work you are doing, being sick." Because he couldn't understand. So then he told me, "There is a message that you stop working every day, and don't heal everybody. You are to pick and choose." All this message I got.
MISHLOVE: The message, that came through the Frenchman.
CHAKRAVARTI: Through that Frenchman. And then I changed my way of work also.
MISHLOVE: And your husband eventually came to --
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes. My husband didn't believe in the beginning, but when the scientists and medical doctors challenged me, 50 of them, and they were from America also -- they were doing some research work on ESP people -- extrasensory perception. They were very much interested in me, and they wanted to meet me, because my name came out in the newspaper there. I had no idea; they said they wanted to challenge me, and at that stage I was very much interested to know what I have got. When they wanted to meet me I agreed immediately; I wanted to meet them. But there actually they wanted to challenge me. For example, there was a doctor, and first they started asking all sorts of medical questions. I said, "I don't know anything of medical, so I cannot answer all these questions. Better I show my work with my hand." Then there was a doctor, a very famous doctor, who had had a massive heart attack, but he told me that he was fine, fit; the only thing was his wife insisted that I take you up. So that is how I put my hand; my hand sent straight to his heart, and I got a little frightened. I thought that he didn't know, so I said, "It seems that something is wrong with your heart. No harm in getting one ECG done. If there is nothing wrong, no problem, but I feel there is some problem going on for two years." All the doctors were surrounding me, no? They were really so surprised. Then he said, "Madame, I had a massive heart attack two years back."
MISHLOVE: So your work with your hand, as it vibrates it both serves to diagnose and to heal.
CHAKRAVARTI: And heal, yes, yes. The current starts passing. There is really a minute electric current that passes, but which in every individual is different. Some people feel I am holding a piece of ice. Some people feel heat passing through my fingers. It's all different, so I don't know.
MISHLOVE: And for all of these years you have never charged anybody.
CHAKRAVARTI: No, never. I don't want to take anything from anybody, no. It is a gift of God, so how can I charge? No.
MISHLOVE: Of course many other healers do.
CHAKRAVARTI: But I think no. I am made in a different way. When you stand in sunlight, or under the rain, or something, you don't pay for it, no? God's gift is in abundance, so why should I, if he has given me, picked me out like this as a very special person? Before that, actually from my childhood, I was very different. I was never interested. But before I became aware of this gift, whatever there was a trace of thing in me, that also went off. Because I feel he prepared me for this work, that I should never mix it up with material things.
MISHLOVE: With material things.
CHAKRAVARTI: I actually give. I don't take. It is through my hand I give his gift, pass on his gift, and whatever material things I can help people, I do that.
MISHLOVE: You don't even accept gifts.
CHAKRAVARTI: No. I don't like to. But I was invited by this Saudi king. In Islam, it is a must, you know. Their messenger told me, "Madame, it's very insulting." Then I said, "OK, if people give me some symbolic, small thing, I can" -- actually very little monetary value, no? -- "as a token of their love, or something, then I will accept, otherwise not." Actually in my house, people bringing fruits also, my husband used to get upset and angry. He said, "OK, take one, and return them. Otherwise, anyway that means you are taking." The only thing he said that if people want to offer, let them offer flowers. Like we go to the temple, or anywhere we want to with something, it's flowers. So that is why.
MISHLOVE: Also in your work, obviously there's a certain -- I suppose I could say a spiritual wealth that comes through, through your contact with Sai Baba, and through the energy that comes through you. Sometimes Sai Baba even offers wisdom.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes. Sometimes, you know, people ask me certain questions. I feel I'm not answering. Through me he is answering. For example, I'll get the same type of vibration, whether it is a mosque or a church. No, it doesn't make any difference. So I like to visit any place of God.
MISHLOVE: One of the discourses that you wrote about, that Sai Baba expressed through you, was about suffering.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes. And actually, I was myself very sick, and today I still don't know whether really it was a dream or a vision. Because I had a major operation; I couldn't stand up. And I had a dream. I visited his place in Bombay, and I was there, and in the early morning I never used to sleep, there was so much pain. I just saw him, bending over my bed, and he spoke in a different language, not my language. He spoke in Urdu. And he said -- normally that was the language he used to speak mostly in Shirdi, where he used to be. He told me, "My child, today you are going to be all right." And it was so surprising that I got rid of my pain and everything. That was a shocking incident for my husband also, because just after my surgery I wanted to visit that place, and that was my first contact with him. My husband was furious, because I had previous to that lots of surgery and every time it was a failure. So he was very upset that I was again climbing stairs.
MISHLOVE: You were still quite sick at this point.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, I just came out of the hospital. I told my husband, "I'll go." So I thought to leave my husband, still I must go and visit this place. He stood outside, so I just went, and I just felt something pass between me and that statue. I just never took it as a statue. I felt as if some living force is sitting there, and I felt something.
MISHLOVE: It was a statue of Sai Baba.
CHAKRAVARTI: Statue of Sai Baba in Bombay. It's a beautiful statue. And actually that is the one, because in Shirdi it is made of white marble, but in Bombay, that place, it is just like a human being, colored stone, you know. The eyes are blue, and the cheeks are, you know, and everything is just like a normal human being. So I came out and my husband was furious. He said, "Do you want to go back to the hospital?" Whatever it is, but I came home and still I was having pain. Then this vision came, and my husband even got very much surprised. Then I told him, "Now you have seen, so you'd better go and visit him, because we will be going every time. My operation was never a success." So he went and prayed. He was a very different type of person. Then he brought some flowers, just to prove that he went there.
MISHLOVE: So here you are a healer, and yet the diseases that you suffer from were actually cured by surgery, eventually.
CHAKRAVARTI: Actually, before this, actually one time I diagnosed my own problem, because during my surgery, before that I had one more. So the doctor said, "We have to cut on the sides of your abdomen. After the surgery I was in terrific pain, but my whole body was bandaged. I couldn't understand. I thought they had cut on my sides. My husband went to get a pain killer. It was a very expensive nursing home. They just write the medicine; you have to go to get it from the chemist. He went to get the medicine. I was in acute pain. Then I thought -- I was doing this work, so I said, "People say that I am gifted, so let me try with my own hand."
MISHLOVE: To heal yourself.
CHAKRAVARTI: And it's so strange that my hand went to the center of my abdomen, and my pain went off within five minutes. The agony of the pain which I was suffering for a few years went off. But actually after this I had one or two, but because of previous sickness I'm not a very healthy person. I don't bother about myself now. I feel now somehow I'll manage to survive and do this work.
MISHLOVE: You work for many hours every day healing people.
CHAKRAVARTI: Previously I used to do work every day. But after the message I started making it less; in a more disciplined way I work. Because it takes away quite a lot. And then, after writing this book, it's quite a bit of nuisance, I must say. People like to come and see me, visit me, like to talk. So that is also another disturbing factor. But I really like to heal people.
MISHLOVE: And when you do heal, and your hand starts shaking, you have to keep healing until it stops.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, that's right.
MISHLOVE: With each person it's different.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, it's different.
MISHLOVE: Your hand goes to the place on the body that has the pain, and it will vibrate and vibrate.
CHAKRAVARTI: That's right, yes. Sometimes they don't have pain. It is a clot; there is no pain.
MISHLOVE: A blood clot.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes. There is no pain. Sometimes an ulcer case -- no pain.
MISHLOVE: An ulcer.
CHAKRAVARTI: So the thing is, as long as my hand vibrates, it is like a dose of medicine. But the thing is that the gift has increased quite a lot, and it's now much faster than what it was before.
MISHLOVE: At times you would spend 45 minutes vibrating your hand.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, in quite serious cases. Sometimes it is just five minutes, ten minutes. So normally I give half an hour for each patient.
MISHLOVE: Half an hour. But then people would need to come back as well.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, that's right.
MISHLOVE: Continued treatment.
CHAKRAVARTI: And it goes on decreasing, the vibration. Then suddenly it stops. And then I cannot do anything.
MISHLOVE: If there's no vibration, you just tell them.
CHAKRAVARTI: I tell them. I normally -- in that way I am like a medical doctor. I like to get it investigated by a scientific way. Not that -- because they are feeling better, and they love me and all that -- no, no; that sort of thing won't count. I want proof also. That's the case.
MISHLOVE: So you encourage your patients to work with doctors.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes, yes. So many times, lots of diseases, I don't know the names of those. I have to ask my doctor. But lots of doctors are my patients.
MISHLOVE: Well, that is interesting, because you have no medical background.
CHAKRAVARTI: No, no, no.
MISHLOVE: You were a housewife when you began this work.
CHAKRAVARTI: That's all, yes.
MISHLOVE: Well, I was talking earlier about the message from Sai Bab about suffering, and the value of suffering. You have suffered a lot.
CHAKRAVARTI: Yes. I think if we don't suffer we can't achieve anything. That's my way. You know, you put gold for making finer jewelry, no? It has to pass through fire. For a diamond, if you want the real surface to come out of it, then you have to cut it and cut it and cut it. I think only through suffering all our wonderful human qualities come out in us -- which sometimes we don't know of them. So that is why -- and not only that. Unless and until you suffer, how will you understand other suffering? This is a must. Because unless and until you also realize what the person is passing through, you cannot work. I feel that way. I become one with my patient. I don't believe in separate issues. So when I touch a person, sometimes I feel. Recently I was working on a patient, a very confused child, and I felt she was really missing the love of a human being, the real -- there is no motive for that sort of love, you know. I even feel that she didn't get that sort of love from her own mother. That lady was also present in that place where I was. So I just told that girl, "I touch you and I feel all your suffering." When I touch a person, I feel their suffering. It's very painful. And then I told that child, "Just for a few minutes, you just think I am your own mother. I have brought you to this art." And immediately there is such a wonderful relationship between us, and the child got cured very fast, and she told me -- her mother was also there. I asked, "Is she still here?" She said, "She is leaving tomorrow." I told her, "I am also leaving tomorrow." "Oh no, where are you going?" So I could see the difference -- her attitude toward me and her own mother. These things, more and more, I am understanding, you know. Sometimes people, they can't even interact with their own loving people. The person -- maybe sometimes the husband and wife; it is sometimes our ego, or our self that we have something, our own independence -- we should not; it is a sign of weakness. Maybe there are so many complex in the human mind, I can't tell you. But I feel sometimes that love is lost between person to person now, and that is a very important art. This has to come back.
MISHLOVE: It seems as if we protect ourselves from feeling the suffering of other people.
CHAKRAVARTI: That's right. We don't want to suffer. You know, some pill we'll take. But I think pain is also a lesson in our life, necessary. I'm not saying that you go on suffering too much. But sometimes pain is also necessary, part of our growth.
MISHLOVE: And you expose yourself to people's pain all of the time in your work.
CHAKRAVARTI: All the time, all the time. I did animals also. I did plants also. Yes.
MISHLOVE: And yet you seem so radiant. It's as if even though you feel their pain it doesn't punish you, somehow.
CHAKRAVARTI: I think it helps me to go nearer to God, to reach him, through their suffering. It becomes much easier, the contact between me and my guru or my God. Even I feel -- I have lost my husband; I feel the presence of my husband, even, because I feel I can even reach him. So we can reach so many things.
MISHLOVE: Yes. Well, Sree Chakravarti, what an amazing life you life. It's as if by exposing yourself to the pain of the world, and doing your healing work without accepting any payment for it, you have opened yourself up to a much larger world than we see through our eyes and feel with our senses. It has been such a joy spending this time with you.
CHAKRAVARTI: It's my pleasure also to come in contact with a person like you, so that also I can interact with you. It's my pleasure.
MISHLOVE: Thank you so much for being with me.
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