JOIN USThe late Ramesh S Balsekar was a sage in the Advaitic tradition. He inspired an entire generation of spiritual seekers. They were touched by his ability to reach out to their hearts, answer their deepest queries and provide solace to the genuine seeker.
He was a disciple of the redoubtable Nisargadatta Maharaj, who likewise initiated thousands into spiritual life. Balsekar was drawn to Advaita in his early years and used to enjoy going through the teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi, the sage of Arunachala and the works of Wei Wu Wei as an adult.
His historic meeting with Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj took place by accident. Soon after his retirement at age sixty, Ramesh read a magazine article about a spiritual master called Nisargadatta Maharaj who was giving discourses on Advaita (philosophy of non-dualism) in a poor suburb of Bombay. This was a subject that was close to his heart and he went to hear him.
On meeting him, he intuitively knew that he had found his spiritual preceptor. In a few months, began translating for Maharaj at his daily morning talks. It was only a matter of time when before Ramesh too experienced the same illumination.
After his retirement from banking, Ramesh discovered Nisargadatta Maharaj, who became his guru. Ramesh wrote extensively on Advaita numbering nearly fifty books. Each of his works are a delight to read and it usually has the effect of uplifting the spirits of the spiritual seeker by recharging his batteries in the quest for self-revelation. He began writing in 1982 and would meet spiritual seekers almost daily at his home in Mumbai. He died on September 27, 2009.
As Wayne Liquorman wrote: “Twenty-two years ago Ramesh came into my life... To have been able to walk beside him for all this time and to have been able to bow at his feet has been for me the greatest of life’s blessings. I shall miss not being able to sit with Ramesh, to watch a cricket match together or to share some chocolate or to laugh at some silly joke he reads from the newspaper. It is not the greatness of the man I will miss most -- his greatness remains undiminished by his death -- it is the little things, the human things.”
It is tor these rare qualities that he is fondly remembered.