Sri Gajapathi Aiyyer was a distinguished lawyer and a devotee par excellence of the Maharshi. He came to Ramanasramam in the 1930s. He stayed for perhaps six months and kept meticulous diaries of the meetings in Bhagavan’s hall.

He is the author of the core of the manuscript known as Aham Sphurana. It seems in 1950’s his friend Swami Rajeshwarananda  wanted to publish these notebooks. At that time the ashram didn’t have the necessary resources. Now some 70 years later a manuscript has appeared, Aham Sphurana, which appears to contain the material from Gajapathi Aiyyer’s Red Notebooks. It may well be other material has been added. It is a huge text of more than 2000 pages. The whole manescript is available on Amazon as an ebook and a huge hardback book appearing like an ancient bible.

In 1948 Sri Gajapathi Aiyyer and his friend Swami Rajeshwarananda took a trunk containing half-a-dozen notebooks to Ramanashram and it was unpacked in front of Bhagawan in Dec. 1948.  

Gajapathi Aiyyer ran through the books patiently. They are hardbound notebooks as such, all of the same variety, done in beautiful red rexine. The pages are serially numbered from one to three hundred, in black ink; the pages opening on to the left-hand side have their number inscribed at the top left corner and those on the right- hand side at the top right corner. The pages are lined with bluish lines in narrow spacing, and filled with young Gajapathi’s meticulous note-making competencies, all expressed by pencil.

When he came to the record of his experiences at the Madurai Meenakshi Temple, “I was like that in Madurai, shedding tears of longing at the Meenakshi Temple, without having the slightest clue why… even the thought, ‘Why am I crying?’ did not occur…” [ could this be B. talking?]
Bhagavan smiled and said, எல்லாவற்ற

Swami Rajeshwarananda remarked:- “Gajapathi feels that he has committed an offence by chronicling your words without having sought out your permission.”
B.: பறவா இல்ைல.

Gajapathi : I only wrote for my own recollection; if shown to others, will it not lead to confusion? Bhagawan gives specific advice to individual persons on spiritual matters; if shown to an unrelated person will that person not erronously think that the advice is applicable to his own case also, and thus mislead himself, with unwarranted consequences? Yet Swami Rajeshwarananda wants to make it available for all in the Ashram to inspect…

Swami Rajeshwarananda: Bhagawan’s words are more solemn and sacred than the Upanishads even. Why opine they could mislead anyone?
B.: இந்த ஆவ

Gajapathi : But Bhagawan gives different responses to the same question to different persons, depending upon individual temprament!
B.: If the reply found is not satisfactory, the search continues! The earnest Sadhaka does not make himself content with the receipt of a response felt by him to be unsuitable, or only partially satisfactory…. An intellect made subtler and subtler by repeated and prolonged submergence in Being, will automatically reject advice that directs it away from the Heart… Practising firm Inherence in the Heart strenghens the faculty of intuition to the extent that it seeks out, time and again, only those words that redirect its course toward the self-resplendant Heart; such discrimination is not a function of the fictitious sense of individual free will; rather, it is automatic and comes by God’s Grace to the sincere seeker…

Gajapathi was about to say something, but it was time for the veda parayanam to begin.

Bhagawan, reaching for his stick, remarked before leaving:
“There is a destiny guiding the course of events… One need not fret about anything, imagining oneself to be personally responsible for it…”

Now the master is in the body no more, but we feel his guidance nonetheless. Swami Rajeshwarananda humbly believe that it is the Master’s will which is prompting us to take the step of making the contents of these notebooks available to a wider audience. I have discussed the idea with Gajapathi and he agreed to make a combined synopsis out of the notebooks, so that the Master’s teachings shining in them may be published as a convenient volume, with contents arranged either date-wise or thematically.