Swami Ashok Bharti
Swami Ashok Bharti is one of Osho’s close disciples. He is showing the path to the country and the world with his powerful voice and powerful thoughts.
Bharti came to Osho as a bud, and today he has blossomed into a flower. Osho has chosen Swami Ashok Bharti as his messenger of religion.
Ashok Bharti ji was born in the year 1948 in a very poor family in Amravati district of Maharashtra.
Ashok Bharti’s grandmother was a priestess in a nearby Lord Krishna temple, where she used to take Ashok Bharti along with her.
When Bharti was three years old, he used to go to the temple with his grandmother and dance in front of Lord Krishna by tying bells on his feet.
All the devotees who came to the temple used to lure Ashok by saying, ‘Show me your dance, I will give you four annas.’
So, in the greed of four or eight annas, Bharti used to tie ghungroos to his feet and dance in front of God,
which made all the devotees very happy and they used to happily give money to Ashok. At that time Ashok Bharti was only 03 years old.
This continued for a few years. When Bharti turned 07, then a very famous and renowned saint of that time Swami Shri Ramsukhdas Ji Maharaj came to the courtyard of the same temple.
Swami Shri Ramsukhdas Ji stayed in that temple for 8 days, due to which Ashok Bharti got the chance to sit at the feet of Swami Ji for 8 days and also got a chance to serve him.
He would fill water for Swami Ji, clean his room, fix his bed, provide him with necessary items etc.
In this way, Bharti served Swami Shri Ramsukhdas Ji very well for 8 days.
The result of staying in the proximity of Swami Ji and serving him selflessly was that the seeds of spirituality started growing in the heart of little Ashok.
And the love for God started arising in his heart automatically, at that time no one knew that later on this child would show the path to the whole world.
Thus, Bharti spent his childhood in some poverty and some normal circumstances and completed his primary education in Amravati itself.
Bharti’s childhood was spent in great poverty, so he knew very well that a lot of money is needed to run a family.
The name of Swami Ashok Bharti’s wife is Ma Anand Sheela (Shalu Maa).
Who left her body on Buddha Purnima on 26.05.21. And vileen in panchtatva forever.
Since Bharti was very good in studies, he got a job as a typist in Amravati District Court as soon as he turned 18.
Where he used to do typing work from morning to evening and started living his family with the earnings from it.
When Swami Ashok Bharti was 19 years old, Acharya Rajneesh arrived in Amravati in the year 1967.
When Bharti came to know that someone like Osho has come, who gives wonderful discourses on spirituality,
Bharti was already interested in spirituality, so he spontaneously reached there to listen to Osho’s discourse.
This was the time when Ashok Bharti saw Gurudev Rajneesh Osho for the first time. He heard Osho’s discourse, which impressed him a lot.
And after that discourse, there were discourses of Gurudev Osho in many nearby areas, so Ashok Bharti used to reach there too and listen to the discourses of Gurudev Osho,
And after the discourse, he used to serve him and also spend time with him, due to which he got to know a little about Gurudev Rajneesh Osho and Osho also got attached to Bharti.
Five years after this unique event, in the year 1972, Gurudev Rajneesh Osho’s Dhyan Sadhna camp was organized in Mount Abu.
Bharti reached there with great eagerness along with his wife.
He listened to the entire discourse with great emotion and after the discourse, he told his heart’s desire to Gurudev Shri Rajneesh Osho that he wanted to become his disciple and he considered him as his Sadguru.
Then Gurudev Osho asked Swami Bharti that what do you do? Then Ashok Bharti said, ‘Gurudev, I am a small typist in Amravati Court.’
Hearing this, Gurudev Osho smiled and closed his eyes and told Ashok Bharti to leave that job.
Ashok Bharti said, ‘Gurudev, how can I avoid your order? You said it and I left it.’ And after this, on 15th October 1972,
Bharti along with his wife took initiation from Sadguru Osho.
After receiving initiation, Bharti requested his Gurudev- ‘What is the order for me now?’
Acharya Osho ordered that you go from here to Mumbai, where our center is ‘Jeevan Jagriti Kendra’
There you will meet a person named Ishwar Bhai, take my books, my literature and my audio and video cassettes from him and go on a tour of India and spread my message throughout India.
On receiving the order from his Gurudev Shri Osho, Ashok Bharti came straight from Mount Abu to Mumbai,
From where he picked up Shri Osho’s books and cassettes and kept roaming all over India for many years and kept spreading his Guru’s message to the people.
You will be surprised to know that after receiving the order from Gurudev Osho
Swami Ashok Bharti went straight from Mount Abu to Mumbai and from there left for India tour
From that day till today he never went to Amravati Court.
Swami Ashok Bharti tells that after receiving the order from his Sadguru, he never even climbed the stairs of Amravati Court.
What happened to his job in his absence, whether he was dismissed or suspended or fired, he himself does not know.
When Swami Bharti was spreading the message of his Sadguru all over India, Osho was not very famous at that time. And there was not much publicity of his name either.
The little publicity that was there through the media was very negative, so wherever Ashok Bharti discussed Osho, told people about his knowledge
then Bharti often had to listen to abuses. People despised Ashok Bharti
and many times even asked him to leave his village.
So in such a situation, Ashok Bharti used to spend the night in a hut outside the village,
at that time he did not have much money either, so sometimes he had to spend the night at the railway station
or sometimes under a tree and sometimes he had to sleep on an empty stomach.
Facing many such adverse circumstances, Swami Ashok Bharti did the sacred work of spreading the message of Sadguru Osho all over India.
And this Bharat Yatra program of Swami Ashok Bharti Ji continued for 7 years (till 1979).
The result of staying out of home for 7 years, not having a regular routine and doing excessive physical labour was that
his health started deteriorating, due to which he started facing difficulty in travelling. Therefore, Swami Ashok Bharti thought that now he will settle in one place and spread the message of his Sadguru.
Therefore, after 1979, Ashok Bharti came to Jabalpur city of Madhya Pradesh, where some arrangement for his stay was made and
he also started doing some work to earn his livelihood and along with this work, he also kept spreading the message of his Guru to the people.
In this way, Swami Ashok Bharti stayed in Jabalpur for about 6 years and kept spreading the knowledge of his Gurudev to the people.
In December 1985, Gurudev Osho returned to India from Rajneeshpuram in America and came to Manali.
As soon as Ashok Bharti came to know that his Gurudev has come to India and is staying in Manali
he immediately reached Manali and stayed in Osho’s presence for about a month and spent time with him.
There he would listen to Osho’s discourses, serve him, sit near him, watch him walk and sing songs written by him for him.
This continued for about a month, after a month Gurudev Osho left for Nepal from Manali
After staying in Nepal for a few days, he again left for the world tour. And Bharti came back to Jabalpur and again got busy with his work.
On 29th July 1986, Gurudev Osho came to India again and this time he stayed in Mumbai, as you all might know that at that time Osho had an ashram in Pune,
but due to some personal reasons he did not want to go to his Pune ashram
so he stayed in a small three bedroom apartment of one of his friends in Mumbai for about 6 months.
As soon as Ashok Bharti came to know that Sadguru has come back to India, he came to Mumbai to get the company of his Sadguru.
In the apartment where Osho was staying, one room was made his bedroom and
there was a seating arrangement for about 50 people in its drawing room, where Osho used to give discourses daily.
Every day at the beginning and at the end of the discourse, Bharti used to sing songs for Sadguru Osho.
It was on 08 August 1986, Osho called Swami Ashok Bharti to his bedroom and listened to his songs for about half an hour.
Ashok Bharti would write a new song every day, compose its tune and sit at the feet of Sadguru Osho and sing that song in his own voice and dedicate it to Osho.
This continued for 06 months, Osho would listen to the songs written by his favorite disciple Swami Ashok Bharti with great pleasure and encourage him.
Osho liked all his songs, there is no song that Osho did not like.
With Osho’s inspiration and blessings, Swami Bharti wrote about 250 songs on Sadguru Osho and dedicated them to him.
After 06 months, Osho came to his ashram in Pune, where he brought Ashok Bharti along with him.
At that time, there was no arrangement for more people to stay in the ashram, so about 8 to 10 people used to stay together in each room of the ashram.
But even in such a situation, if someone was staying in a single room at that time, then they were only two people, first Sadguru Osho and second Swami Ashok Bharti.
Swami Ashok Bharti tells that Sadguru Osho showered a lot of love on him.
When Osho felt that his disciple has matured by staying in his company, then one day he called Ashok Bharti
and said that now you go, then Bharti came to Jabalpur from Pune as per the order of his Sadguru.
Ashok Bharti tells that by staying in the company of Sadguru Osho, he had many spiritual experiences and all his curiosity ended by sitting at the feet of Sadguru Osho.
Osho has also discussed about his favorite disciple many times during his discourses.
There are a total of 04 discourses of Sadguru Osho on Swami Ashok Bharti, in which Osho has discussed about Swami Ashok Bharti in detail.
In one discourse, Osho has spoken about Swami Ashok Bharti for almost an hour and has given his blessings.