How the Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu discourses were published
How did all the Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu books come to be published?
In 2021, his daughter Anuradha Gajaraj-Lopez started writing a book on Sage Agastya 'Agastya: History, Legend & Reality'. It was while writing the book that she realized that most of the discourses from Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu had remained unpublished.
Maryann Villegas, who was proofreading the book for Anuradha, pointed out to her that maybe there was something more that Anuradha had to accomplish, since it was she who had found the statue. The words touched something deep within Anuradha, and she decided to translate and publish all the discourses of Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu. Easier said than done! There were so many challenges. The notebooks in which the discourses had been written down were in India. Anuradha was already in the US. Also, her knowledge of Tamil was minimal, definitely not good enough to translate extensive Tamil texts with words totally unfamiliar to her.
She first began translating the first book already published by Gajaraj Swamigal: Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu. Ramesh Sargam and Usha Mohan helped Anuradha by reading the book to her in Tamil as she transliterated them in English in real time. Work never stopped, even when Ramesh was travelling. He would carry the book wherever he went and connect with Anuradha on WhatsApp to continue reading to her. Looking up meanings of words, asking her Tamil speaking friends to explain the terms she couldn't understand, Anuradha completed the translation. The book was published in three months as 'Agastya, The Path'.
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| The original Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu published by Gajaraj Swamigal |
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| Translation of this originally published book. |
It was then that help came from unexpected quarters. John Gunter Thomas who had read her book 'Agastya: History, Legend and Reality' searched for and connected with Anuradha by Facebook. It was through him that Anuradha got connected to Rev. Bill McDonald. This great soul, recognizing the importance of the work, immediately put his shoulder to the wheel, interviewing Anuradha as soon as the book was published. The interview aired on Youtube, had over 1000 views in one day!
Then came the task of publishing all the remaining discourses. help arrived from different quarters. Sumathy Venkataraman collected all the books from Arul Thai Vijayalakshmi and converted them to pdf files. It was also this blessed soul who hand carried them to US for Anuradha. Ramesh Sargam, Usha Mohan and Vijayalakshmi Ravindran, were the three blessed souls that agreed to read the handwritten texts to Anuradha.
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| The 16 handwritten books were converted to pdf. |
Other devotees that Anuradha got connected with through James, were Aditya Ayodhya, Deepti Karpur, and Uvaraj. Aditya and Deepti assisted Anuradha with the proof reading of these books. Kristen Shay who became part of the growing circle of Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu, proofread the books, identifying and making more corrections. Rajesh B, another devotee volunteered as well and completed the proof reading.
As more and more people began to be ask about Gajaraj Swamigal and his life, Anuradha wrote the book 'Agastya's Disciple: Firsthand Chronicles of an Extraordinary Life.'
Rakesh of Thedi Ulla Theeni group, Smt Vijayalakshmi Ravindran, and Hema Sundar proofread the Tamil books. Soon Shivkumar Ramdas, with a very keen eye and great command over English as well as Tamil joined the effort. With his help, proof reading went to another level altogether! When the thought of translating some Kannada chapters into Tamil came, it was Sarvanan Kandaswamy who stepped up, effortlessly translating them to Tamil. Money poured in through many blessed individuals.
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| Incorporating corrections in Tamil |
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| Transliterated pages used for the English books |
More devotees joined to help distribute the books. They were Sumathy Venkataraman, Deepti Karpur, Veena Raghavan, Sivansri Mahesh, Rakesh of TUT, Dr. Sathyanarayan Mamtha and Dr Mahesh Kidangil. It was also around this time that through Uvaraj of Malaysia, Anuradha came in contact with Sri Sri Vallai Maharishi, Agastya Gnana Peetam, Malaysia. This great soul, recognizing the importance of Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu, visited Arul Thai Vijayalakshmi in India three times and held satsang for devotees in India. He also personally released all three Tamil Volumes. Dr Mahesh Gurukkal, travelled to Malaysia on the invitation of Vallai Maharishi and released Volume 2 of Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu there.
While the first set of Tamil books were printed as a bilingual with Tamil and English discourses presented as received by Gajaraj Swamigal, efforts are on to reprint the books completely in Tamil. To this effect, another blessed soul Subbulaksmi Periaswamy of California, who is working tirelessly translating all the English discourses to Tamil.
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| Copies of all these three are available upon request in India |
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| Copies are available upon request in India |
Soon, other books were compiled. Garland of Verses from Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu, a compilation of verses from Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu in Tamil, English and English transliteration was published.
Smt. Geeta Shetty of Mumbai was the blessed soul who after hearing that Sage Agastya had directed that the discourses on Marriage must be published as booklets and distributed, took up that sacred task. She has also helped extensively in collecting funds and distributing other books connected with Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu.
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| Copies of both these books are available on request in India |
Some common questions and thoughts arose in devotees as they read 'Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu'. Meanwhile, meaningful discussions were also taking place between devotees about the content in 'Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu'. So a book, 'Walking on the Path of Agasthiyar Vazhipaadu' was compiled by Anuradha Gajaraj-Lopez with the help of Jayashree B.L.
The book is also available on Amazon.
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