Satsang "SHIRDI DIARY' DADASAHEB KHAPARDE

Dadasaheb Khaparde visited Shirdi in all five times during Sai Baba's life
time. The chronological dates of his visit to Shirdi and the period of his
stay there are as given below:
First Visit - >From 5th December, 1910 to 12th December 1910.
Second Visit - From 6th December, 1911 to 15th March, 1912.
Third Visit - From 29th December, 1915 to 31st December, 1915.
Fourth Visit - On 19th May, 1917 in the company of Lokamanya Tilak.
Fifth Visit - A short visit of unspecified number of days in March, 1918.

Let us now consider each visit separately and see what information is
available in the biography of Dadasaheb Khaparde in addition to what is
already published so far in earlier volumes of Shri SaiLeelain 1924-25.
First visit in December, 1910
Dadasaheb Khaparde arrived in Bombay from Pune and with his eldest son
Balakrishna went to Shirdi on 5th December. He stayed there for seven days
and on getting permission from Sai Baba to depart on 12th December, arrived
in Akola on 13th December. Normally, he travelled by the first class in days
when there were three to four classes of railway travel. However, on this
occasion as he did not have sufficient money on his person, he travelled by
the second class and reached Amraoti on 19th December via Akola. It is
recorded that he walked down from Amraoti railway station to his residence!
That a person of Dadasaheb's standing should even have no money to hire a
vehicle to go to his residence may cause great surprise, Dadasaheb's annual
income by way of legal practice at one time was of the order of rupees
90,000 to 95,000 when there was no income-tax legislation and living was
cheap. Yet the state of affairs described above was inevitable in the
circumstances as Dadasaheb lived beyond his means.

At one time, he had seven horses including two Australian-bred; two
carriages, one state and the other ordinary, with staff to look after them.
He was generous to a fault and gave shelter to a number of families. He
kept an open house and his house was always full of guests on whom he
spent lavishly for their comfort and entertainment including nautch parties!
Now the reader can appreciate why he had to foot the distance from the
railway station to his residence. The account of this visit as reported in
Shri Sai Leela appears to be complete on comparison with the narration
in the biography.

Second visit in December, 1911

The second visit of Dadasaheb Khaparde to Shirdi was the longest, his stay
extending to hundred days. This is significant and needs examination in
some detail for inspite of the desire of Dadasaheb and his wife to return to
Amraoti time and again, Sai Baba detained them in Shirdi and would not let
them go. And since Dadasaheb had implicit faith in his Sadguru, Dadasaheb
dutifully obeyed the orders of Sai Baba believing and knowing full well that
Baba's decision was in his interest.
Now what could have been the reason for Sai Baba keeping Dadasaheb for
such a long time in

Shirdi? The readers are aware that Dadasaheb Khaparde was a prominent
aide and supporter of Lokamanya Tilak. Tilak had been arrested on 24th
June, 1908 and tried on the charge of sedition. His trial began on 13th July,
1908, and he was convicted and sentenced to six years' imprisonment on
22nd July, 1908. Within a few days thereafter, i.e. on 15th August 1908,
Dadasaheb sailed for England to prefer an appeal to the Privy Council against
the judgment of the Bombay High Court convicting Lokamanya. He reached
Dover on 31st August, 1908 and immediately proceeded to London. As
planned he filed a petition in the Privy Council but the Privy Council refused
leave to appeal against the Bombay High Court's judgment. The next move
of Khaparde to appeal to the House of Lords failed for lack of support. A
memorial sent to Lord Morley, the Secretary of State for India also proved to
be of no avail.
All attempts having proved futile, Khaparde sailed for India via Rangoon on
15th September 1910 after a stay of over two years in England. He 'had left
no stone unturned to get the judgment against Tilak reversed. He had gone
at his own expense to England to campaign for his leader's release. His
Herculean labour in England brings out not only his qualities of loyalty and
devotion to his leader but also selflessness and the price he was prepared
to pay in terms of energy, time and expense for a cause he believed to be
just. Dadasaheb's mother passed away on 27th September, 1910 while he
was on the high seas. Khaparde reached Rangoon on 16.10.1910 and met
Tilak in Mandalay Jail on 22.10.1910. Having reached Calcutta on 27.10.1910,
he returned home on 5.11.1910 after an absence of two years, two months and
twenty-two days.

(Source Shirdi Diary)
http://www.saileelas.org/books/dairy.htm