In my childhood days I used to take my friends to the river. There was a small path by the side of the river. To walk on that edge was very dangerous; just one step taken in unconsciousness and you will fall into the river, and that was the place where the river was the deepest. Nobody used to go there, but that was my most loved spot. And I will take all my friends to come along with me to move on that narrow edge. Very few were ever ready to go along with me, but those few had really a beautiful experience. They will all report, “This is strange, how the mind stops!”

I will take my friends to the railway bridge to jump from the bridge into the river. It was dangerous, certainly dangerous; it was prohibited. There was always a policeman standing on the railway bridge because that was the place from where people used to commit suicide. We had to bribe the policeman, that “We are not committing suicide, we have just come to enjoy the jump!” And slowly slowly he became aware that these are the same people – they don’t die or anything, they come again, they come again and they are not interested in suicide. In fact, he started loving us and stopped taking bribes. He said, “You can jump – I will not look at that side. Whenever you want you can come.”

It was dangerous. The bridge was very high and to jump from there… And before you will reach the river there was a time between – the gap between the bridge and the river – when the mind will suddenly stop.

Those were my first glimpses of meditation; that’s how I became more and more interested in meditation. I started inquiring how these moments can be made available without going to the mountains, to the river, to the bridges; how one can allow oneself to move into these spaces without going anywhere, just by closing one’s eyes. Once you have tasted, it is not difficult.

Sanjay Gandhi died beautifully. He will be born on a far higher plane because he died in a moment when the mind was no more functioning. He died the death of a meditator without knowing what is happening. Of course it was not a conscious meditation, but still there was something of meditativeness in it. His next life will be of a higher quality. Maybe his next life will become more concerned with the inner adventure; this life was more concerned with the outer adventure. He was an extrovert.

He wanted to come here. Many times I had been informed that he wants to come, and this time he had seen all the slides of the ashram. For two hours he was with Laxmi, with Indira, talking, inquiring, was very much interested and wanted to come.

But my feeling was that this life he was more of an extrovert. But this sudden death will bring a transformation into him: he will become an introvert in his next life, and that is something of immense value.

Indira Gandhi must be in great pain. She cannot understand how we celebrate death here. She also wants to come, has been thinking for many days to come. Now she has settled that in August she will be coming, but now the death of Sanjay may again postpone her coming. She is interested in meditation, but she is, obviously, too much occupied with the world, with the problems. And this country has so many problems, almost insoluble.