A Story of Transformation

I've gotten to know some really amazing people here in the first few days at Akshardham. Take the story of our dear Nathuram, or "He Nathuramji!!" as we so affectionately call him (gotta imagine that being said with an Indian accent...), one of the aajivan (has volunteered for the remainder of his lifetime without pay) workers here:

Nathuram was born in a small town in Orissa, on the east side of India to a very poor family. They lived in one of the shanty towns and made a very meager living on the day-laborer wages of his father, who under the stress of poverty was an alcoholic and a chronic smoker.

When Nathuram was 15 he left home to go try to strike a living on his own. He'd go from one odd-job to another, and, after picking up heavy drinking and smoking like his father, added stealing to help finance his addictions. He garnered a cut job (a job contracted for a fixed sum but actually pays less b/c the "boss" takes a cut) as a golf-cart driver in an expensive resort for foreigners. He'd pretty regularly steal money out of the purses or bags of the guests, one time lifting $350 (almost one year worth of salary for him at the time) from the purse of a guest he was driving around. He said that weekend he and his friends spent every last bit of it on hookers, drugs, and alcohol.

When Akshardham was opening, they were hiring golf-carts and their drivers so he came to work here. They gave him a place to stay, fair wages (with no cut), and square meals. He said he couldn't believe it when they said they'd pay him Rs. 2800/- per month and actually gave him Rs. 2800/-. He met with Pramukh Swami Maharaj (the current spiritual leader of BAPS), before the inauguration of Akshardham, who apparently told him "not to steal $350, or any sum of money, from anyone, ever again." Nathuram still has no idea how Pramukh Swami knew about that incident. Pramukh Swami went on to tell him that if he needed anything, he was to simply ask, but ask only for what he truly needed. But he swore not to steal ever again. Shortly thereafter, he said he realized he didn't really "need" the alcohol or the tobacco, so it wasn't worth spending his hard-earned money on. Within six months, he had completely quit using drugs, alcohol, and tobacco.

He credits his association with Swaminarayan with changing his life so much that he decided he wanted to work here for the rest of his life, even if only as a golf-cart driver. And since then, that has been his duty.

Two days ago, "in the same golf cart in which [he] used to rob people under their noses," he chauffered APJ Abdul Kalam, the President of India, around the Akshardham complex. Yesterday he drove around Pramukh Swami Maharaj, and later this month he will be the driver for Dr. Manmohan Singh, the Prime Minister.

Rags to spiritual riches.