Baba was a Mahatma (Great Soul) with uncanny, divine powers. But he called himself “Servant of God,’ and the supernatural feats that occured at his hands, he ascribed to God Himself. He never called himself a Guru and had no disciples too. He had only his devotees.
Now I will tell you some of the earliest leelas of Baba.
Every night, Baba used to light earthen lamps in the Dwarkamai. For this, he asked the grocers to give him oil. In the beginning, people looked upon Baba as a mad fakir, and so the grocers gave him oil just for the fun of it. But soon they got fed up with this daily practice and one day they all refused to give him oil.
With the empty oil-tin dangling from his hand, Baba came back to Dwarkamai, with a merry song on his lips :-
If no oil, I am not worried,
Dwarkamai will supply the need.
He put a little water in the oil tin and drank it, as if to please the God within. Then he took more water, poured it in the lamps and kindled them one by one. Alack and … !
God said, let there be light
And there was light !
The ‘water-lamps’ burnt throughout the night. Those who had come to scoff remained to praise.
This incident established the supernatural powers of Baba beyond a shred of doubt.