Akkaraipatti Sai Baba
Temple is not only famous for being one of the largest temples for ShirdiSai
Baba in South India but also legendary for the fable of its Guru Purnima celebration. The festival of Guru Purnima is celebrated with great reverence and devotion,
followed by a grand puja organized to mark the occasion.
Akkaraipatti Sai Baba
Temple is not only famous for being one of the largest temples for ShirdiSai
Baba in South India but also legendary for the fable of its Guru Purnima celebration. The festival of Guru Purnima is celebrated with great reverence and devotion,
followed by a grand puja organized to mark the occasion.
When Gopalrao Gund was
finally blessed with a child after requesting Sai Baba to alleviate him from
his long-term disconsolateness of not having a child, he asked Baba’s
permission and held a thanksgiving fair on Lord Ram’s birthday which coincided
with the auspicious Urus Day, a Muslim festival honouring a Sufi Saint. It
seems that Sai Baba had some ulterior motive behind this. It was his strategy
to get the two communities together on one day – the unification of Hindus and
Muslims. The celebrations are done on the same day, every year, even today.
In Shirdi, two locally
significant customs are carried out during the festival – the sack of wheat
that is kept in Dwarakamani is changed and the old one is taken to Prasadalaya
to be used there, and secondarily the Dwaraka mani flags are hoisted on the two
corners of the mosque by Damu Anna Rasne of Ahmednagar, a friend of Gopalrao,
who has been blessed with two sons by Baba and another devotee
Nanasaheb Nimonkar. Descendants of these two devotees are continuing this
tradition and the flags are brought in and offered at Sai Baba’s Samadhi (tomb)
before taking the grand procession. The procession begins at the house of three
carpenters who took the responsibility to mend the broken mosque, as an honour.
Then follows the sandal
procession – a tradition of anointing sandal paste. To participate in the
sandal procession, devotees from various states and neighboring places turned
up at the dharga (mosque). Later at the day, prayers are offered and some
religious activities are organized, accompanied by devotional music like
bhajan, public reading of ures and devotional texts. From then on feeding
the poor was done on a large scale. The Samadhi Mandhir stays open for the
entire night during this occasion with qawali sessions and bhajan songs. Every year lakhs of devotees from all the religions throng to the temple to seek darshan and blessings from the " Then Shirdi Sai Baba ".