 ‘The Missionary and me’
My encounter with Brother Shanti Das – Gingee – 1983  I have always been impressed by missionaries and their work. However, generally they operate through nice mission buildings and convents where good food is laid on the table and high tea is served to all visiting dignitaries.
On the contrary, while I was working in South Arcot in 1983, I had a unique encounter with a servant of Christ named Brother Shanti Das in a place called Gingee. Gingee is a very dry part of the district and has a unique landscape formed by volcanic rocks. This gives beauty and character to an otherwise dry and dreary environment.
I was inspecting a water tank when I saw a thin white man about 45, wearing a white dhoti and khadi (hand spun) shirt pedalling away on his cycle in my direction. I was wondering - who is this white man? Why is he here? Why does he wear the garb of an Indian villager? Where is he heading? What is he carrying in the box on his cycle carrier?
I wanted to speak to him, know him, understand him. Instinctively, he stopped and said hello to me. That was the beginning of a deep relationship. I later paid many visits to his hut. Brother Shanti Das was a French missionary who lived with two other brothers, one French and another Indian from Kerala.
They lived in a small run-down compound in a part of which stood ‘a small chapel with a thatch roof’. There were mats on the floor. A small wooden stool, which was carved exquisitely by the Keralite brother served as the Altar.
The brothers belonged to a small sect called ‘Little Brothers of Jesus’. This is a unique brotherhood. The brothers take a vow of poverty and live and work with the poorest of the poor and the neediest in the society.
In Gingee, they were working with the leprosy patients, the handicapped, the disabled, the old and the abandoned. They were volunteers for government’s National Leprosy Programme. When I first met Shanti Das he was on his daily errand of delivering medicines to leprosy patients. He cycled about twenty kilometers per day to ensure that the patients kept to their treatment schedule.
Next to their little home they had made a shelter for abandoned people, where they were trying to teach them useful skills like weaving mats, fabrics, etc. They spent much of their time caring for these unfortunate beings. Their evenings were spent in prayer and meditation. They spent no money on themselves and hardly ate anything.
Impressed by their community work, I offered them Rs. 25000 from the Government’s Rural Development Programme. They wouldn’t touch it. They did not want money. After much persuasion they agreed to buy a few more looms for teaching weaving to young girls in the village and accepted only twelve thousand rupees. This is the only case in my life when people wanted less money than what was offered to them.
They had only two sets of clothes made of coarse material. While they wore one they washed the other. They had no paraphernalia for cooking and put small quantities of rice and lentil in a solar box and allowed it to cook by itself.
One day, when I was in the vicinity, brother Shanti Das invited me in for a cup of tea. I was very thirsty so I agreed and went inside the compound. We kept chatting for about fifteen minutes but there was no trace of the tea. I had to return to Cuddalore for a meeting so I asked brother if I could have my tea and leave.
He walked to a small tree in the middle of the compound, touched an aluminium flask hanging from a branch and said the sky is a bit cloudy so the tea is not yet ready.
Only then, I realised that the tea had to be boiled with the help of Sun’s rays. It would take at least another hour. I informed brother about my impending meeting and excused myself from the tea.
Throughout my journey tears kept rolling down my eyes
I kept thinking how simple life can be:
Tea cooked on branch of a tree,
Food made in a solar box,
Only two sets of clothes to wear,
A bicycle to ride,
And yet so much to give to others.
My little Brothers of Jesus,
So poor in your living,
Yet so rich in your heart,
Where ever you are,
I cherish you in my heart.
(This column is Dedicated to the Australian Missionary - a leprosy worker and his two sons, who were killed in mindless violence in Orissa).
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