(Aug.1946) Meanwhile, during their stay in Rishikesh, Baba and his men spent every day looking for masts. Their days were filled with hardships as Baba, Baidul, Eruch, Kaka Baria and Adi roamed about, walking for hours in the hot sun or rain. They covered a radius of twenty to twenty-five miles around Rishikesh, and in all, five hundred good sadhus and sixty-seven masts and saints were contacted.
One particularly significant contact in Rishikesh was the high yogi and adept pilgrim of the mental planes called Jala Tapasvi. This great yogi wore a green kafni and sat on the roof of a ruined temple which had once stood in the River Ganges but was now submerged. When Kaka and Eruch first went to him, they introduced themselves as Parsis from Bombay, and the yogi at once asked, “How are things there?”
“Much violence! There are now constant riots and disturbances,” they replied.
Jala Tapasvi surprised them by revealing in poignant fashion: “It is natural and indeed inevitable. It is all the work of the Avatar, who is now in form. The great men of the world, the so-called leaders, may be famous and even worshiped by mankind, but they are mere playthings in the hands of the Avatar. They are like kites, the strings of which are held firmly in the Avatar’s grasp, and he controls them as he wishes. “These wars and disturbances will continue, and three-quarters of humanity will be wiped out! For how can the people from Hell mix with the people from Heaven? Those from Hell must be wiped out!”
Jala Tapasvi concluded: “The Avatar will manifest in twenty-two years [1968], but even then, like other Avatars before him, he will be ridiculed by the majority of people, and his real fame will only spread after his death.” As usual, Eruch and Kaka had not once referred to Meher Baba, but when Jala Tapasvi later saw Baba in a house in Rishikesh, he cried out: “The Avatar has come!” Baba was happy with the contact.
Lord Meher, Bhau Kalchuri, Original Publication, Vol 9, pp. 3122 – 3123.