Soon after we announced our move to India, one of our aunts Ms. Annapurna Devi from Phoenix called us with a special request.

Her father-in-law Madhavapeddi Kalidas garu was a very eminent lawyer during the first part of the twentieth century, in a small town near Guntur, named Bapatla. He was Vijaya's grandfather and also happened to be Ram's uncle. He was the first devotee of Sri Shirdi Sai in our extended family and was also active in pre-independence Indian politics. In addition, he was a great supporter and donor of the Congress Party in those days and was on personal terms even with top national leaders like Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru. In short, he was exemplary in many ways and was the pride of our
Madhavapeddi/Gunturi family!

Anyway, our aunt's request was this: During his life time, her father-in-law expressed a wish to construct a Sri Shirdi Sai temple in Bapatla, within the compound of his house. But somehow this never got materialized and the elderly gentleman passed away in 1953. After his demise, the house was sold but an outhouse in the compound was still kept by his children, earmarked for this temple. After all these years, our aunt wanted Ram and Vijaya to help fulfill this wish!

This project was complicated because the location is quite far from Guntur, where we decided to settle down. Secondly, we didn't have any family in Bapatla who could help us locally on this project. So we had to coordinate the whole effort remotely.

But still, because this was a sacred request, we agreed to take it up, with utmost devotion. The required funds were arranged by our aunt and her son. Once we got started on this temple project, we started realizing that if we take one step towards Him, Sai takes a hundred steps towards us!

The first challenge we had to face was to get the outhouse vacated by the person who was leasing it for running a Pharmacy. In the past our aunt and her family tried to get him vacated, but each time he was giving them a lot of trouble by holding on to the property against their wish. So as a first step, we traveled to Bapatla one fine morning and visited the ancient house on the street which is now named after the famous lawyer as the "Kalidas street".

As we stood on the street in front of the ancient house that day, we were filled with emotion. Even though we were too young to have known this eminent grandfather personally, we all grew up listening to so many stories about him, his many virtues and his positive influence over the extended family. It was painful to see that house which had such a distinguished past but was now taken over by multiple businesses and being run in a very commercial way. And we also noticed there was that Pharmacy occupying the outhouse in question :)

At that point, it was past noon. We were carrying our lunch in the car but were not sure where to eat it. So we were standing in the middle of that street trying to figure out what to do. Exactly at that instant, a gentleman came out of the opposite house and greeted us. We turned towards him and we noticed pictures of Sri Shirdi Sai and Sri Satya Sai on either side of their gateway. When he asked us about what we were looking for, we briefly explained our background and why we were there. The gentleman's name was Mr. Hariprasad. Turned out he and his wife were ardent devotees of Sai since many many years. Apparently, they were also active members of the local Sri Satya Sai organization.

As soon as he heard our plan to help build a Sai temple in their neighborhood, he was overjoyed. He invited us into his house, welcomed us to have our lunch there in their dining hall and then relax there comfortably. During the course of conversation, he expressed a lot of interest in our project and also offered any kind of help that we might need locally.

Thus the problem of distance was solved at least partially. Next we told him about the problem of the pharmacist not vacating the outhouse. He said he knew the pharmacist very well, his name was Rajesh and he was their close family friend. He offered to talk to him on our behalf!

So we returned to Guntur that afternoon thanking Lord Sai for helping us resolve the issues one by one. Afew days later, we went back to Bapatla again, upon receiving a call from Mr.Hariprasad that he was able to convince Rajesh to cooperate with us. To our amazement, Rajesh was very cordial and friendly during the meeting and he surrendered the property without any problems! We thanked Bhagwan Sai for showing us this beautiful miracle!

Once the outhouse was handed over to us, we started the remodeling of the structure to give it the form of a temple. Mr. Hariprasad helped us by supervising the work locally. Our aunt's daughter got a beautiful marble idol of Sri Shirdi Sai made in Hyderabad and sent it over. We checked with the priest in Guntur and came up with a sacred muhurtam for the temple inauguration in June 2011.

Before that special day, Ram and Vijaya traveled to Puttaparthi for Sri Rama Navami and there we went to the Ashram book store to purchase life size pictures of Sri Shirdi Sai and Sri Satya Sai. The idea was to get them framed and set them up on either side of the idol, in the temple.

So we looked for pictures of both the Sai forms showing Abhaya Hastam. We found such a picture of Sri Shirdi Sai right away, but for Sri Satya Sai, the picture they had with Abhaya Hastam did not have a proper background. There were some random furniture pieces visible behind Swami. So we skipped that picture and selected a different one where Swami was not showing Abhaya Hastam but was just standing in front of students sitting in rows at a distance and smiling. We were a little disappointed about this but we went back to Guntur after placing an order at the book store in Parthi. After a few days, the package was delivered. When we opened it, to our surprise, we found both the Sai pictures showing Abhaya Hastam! And in the Satya Sai picture, the random furniture pieces in the background were no longer
visible in the print that we received!

We were totally stunned at this unexpected Leela! We got both the pictures framed and took them to Bapatla during our next trip and got them installed there.

Another issue that we had faced was with the property tax for the outhouse that was not paid by the pharmacist (nor the owners) for many many years. An accumulated tax amount of Rs 50000 was due along with a fine which was almost equal to that base tax amount. We didn't have funds to pay such a huge amount, after getting the temple done. While we were wondering about what to do, Ram received a call from Mr. HariPrasad one day. He said that there was news on TV that the government had just offered a waiver on the fine for those who pay the base amount before a certain date! So Ram rushed to Bapatla with the base tax amount of Rs50000. The tax commissioner not only took care of
the tax payment but he also granted a tax-free status to the temple for ever!

On the day of inauguration, our aunt's daughter Rajyalakshmi and her husband came down to Bapatla and together, we four participated in the day long rituals of consecration. Close friends and relatives attended this holy event and received Sai's blessings. With the help of Mr.Hariprasad, we were able to appoint a priest and to this day, the temple has been running smoothly, providing a place of worship and a center for spiritual upliftment for all the people living around that area. Thus our grandfather's long standing wish came true in flying colors. And we felt grateful to be instruments in this entire effort!

More Photos can be viewed at Photogallery Page