Swami Sivananda, who got the Padma Shri award from President Ram Nath Kovind on Monday while walking barefoot in the stately Darbar Hall of Rashtrapati Bhavan, drew a standing ovation.
The yoga practitioner prostrated in front of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the President before collecting the honour, garnering another wave of applause from the guests at the formal investiture event.
Prime Minister Modi quickly bent and touched the ground in response to the greeting.
The yoga teacher, clothed in a white kurta and dhoti, knelt twice more before reaching the dais, and the President walked out to assist Sivananda in rising to his feet, following which he handed over the award and citation.
The President was seen conversing to the Swami while awarding the honour, and the two posed for selfies with the Darbar hall reverberating with enthusiasm.
Swami Sivananda has devoted his life to the advancement of humanity.
His modest techniques of living a disciplined and well-regulated life, including early morning Yoga, an oil-free boiled food, and selfless devotion to mankind in his own way, have given him the longest life free of sickness and strain. Rather than lecturing, he uses his life to serve as an example.
Swami Sivananda was born on August 8, 1896, in the Sylhet area of undivided India (now Bangladesh). At the age of six, he lost both his mother and father. During his boyhood, his destitute parents could only give him boiling rice water due to their extreme poverty.
He was taken to his Guruji’s Ashram in Nabadwip, West Bengal, after the burial ceremonies. Guru Omkarananda Goswami raised him and provided him with every practical and spiritual knowledge, including Yoga, without requiring him to attend school.
Throughout his life, he has been a believer in positive thinking. ‘The world is my home, the people who live in it are my fathers and mothers, and loving and serving them is my religion,’ he believes.
According to the Rashtrapati Bhavan document on Padma recipients, he is still pursuing his objective to help the disadvantaged in many regions of the nation, including North East India, Varanasi, Puri, Haridwar, Nabadwip, and so on.
Swami Sivananda has been servicing 400-600 leprosy-affected beggars in Puri with respect for the past 50 years by personally visiting them in their hutments.
“He sees them as living Gods and provides them with the greatest resources possible. Depending on their specified needs, he prepares various goods such as food, fruits, clothing, winter apparel, blankets, mosquito nets, and cooking utensils “It was said.
He urges others to provide various products to the impacted individuals in order for them to experience the joy of giving and, as a result, be encouraged to perform similar humanitarian action in their own communities.
Swami Sivananda’s long and healthy life has drawn international attention, as has his devotion to encouraging his people to get COVID vaccines after immunising himself at the age of 125.
Corporate hospitals around the country have provided free master health checks to analyse the structural and functional state of his essential organs and systems, as well as watch his lifestyle.
In front of physicians and management teams in a conference hall, in response to a question about the secret of his longest life, he shows various Yoga and exercise as methods of his healthy and long life, in addition to revealing his desireless, simple existence.
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