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talked on all types of topics. He was completely detached from
the worldly affairs, as if he were talking about the Gupta dynasty
or Mauryan period. He said, “Come, sit here, brother. Your Ba
has left this Prasad for you.” I was in Delhi, yet Ba used to send
besan laddoos (a type of sweet). Even Shastriji remembered this
fact, he used to say, “O, you have a child there, send him too.”
When I reached there on the fourth day, I found that my packet
of sweets was kept there in all readiness. Shastriji did not forget
to place that packet in my hand and said, “Take it, your Ba has
left it for you, but it is for the final time.” He was detached from
the worldly affairs after he had assimilated the Gita in his speech
and deed, and it is no trivial thing. Maybe we might not
understand its sense during the course of description, but it
was no insignificant matter.

He loved me as a father should, I too felt like his son, and
so we sometimes quarrelled in that capacity. I shall tell you a
very interesting instance. Shastriji was in the advancing stage
of his, still he did not like to give up the bicycle. We thought
much, yet he did not allow any of our tricks to succeed. At the
age of 85 years even, he used to go to B.J. Vidya Bhavan riding a
bicycle. One day, he met an accident near the railway crossing,
he suffered from a fracture. Now, taking advantage of this
incident, I rightfully said to him as a son, “Now stop riding this
cycle. You have a broken bone, and the cycle has a broken
handle, just think so.” It was only then that everybody’s wish to
stop his cycling was fulfilled.

It appeared as if the devotee of the ‘letter’ had seen God
through the power of learning. The twenty-first century is
considered to be the century of knowledge. Knowledge is being
revealed. Shastriji was devoted to knowledge for decades. He
knew, identified and experienced every word, and made others
feel their taste too. But he never wished to find out time for any
material pleasures or entertainment. When I became the Chief
Minister, I was thinking about Shastriji one day, “How detached
he is! He could have well rung me up because of his fatherly
right, but he never recommended me anything. Nor did he say,
‘Do this or don’t do that, or take notice of it.’”