Everyone is familiar with the slain Pakistani leader & ex- Pak PM Benazir
Bhutto. But few are aware about her zeal for meditation. Here is an article by
Roop Jyoti (ex-minister of state for finance., Nepal ) :
http://www.nepalitimes.com/issue/381/Comment/14340
In the summer of 1994, I got a call from the Home Ministry in Kathmandu. Prime
Minister Benazir Bhutto, who was on an official visit to Nepal, wanted to visit
Dharmashringa Vipassana Center in Kathmandu.Teachers and trustees of the
meditation centre were excited and gathered in the morning awaiting her
arrival. We had made arrangements to show her around and explain the Vipassana
meditation technique in the tradition of Sayagi U Ba Khin as taught by S. N.
Goenka.Unfortunately, the visit was cancelled. The night before someone had
mistakenly told her that the meditation center was a half-hour walk after a
45-minute drive. She did not have that much time and put off the visit.
Actually, the centre can be reached in 30 minutes.Two years later, the Foreign
Ministry contacted us again. Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba was going to
Pakistan and there was a specific request from Benazir Bhutto to bring along a
Vipassana teacher.Our Principal Teacher Acharya Goenkaji asked me and
Nani Maiya Manandhar, both senior teachers, to go with the delegation. Benazir
Bhutto was busy with the state visit and sent word that she would meet us as
soon as she was free. On the last day of the state visit, the Nepali delegates
were returning to Karachi in the afternoon to fly back to Kathmandu. Nani
Maiyaji and I were finally summoned at 3PM, after the rest of the delegation
had flown off. Benazir Bhutto had heard much about Vipassana and wanted to
learn the technique there and then. We told her it required a 10-day retreat.
She did not have such time, and insisted to be taught right away. Acharya
Goenkaji had foreseen such a response and had given permission to teach her the
Anapana technique. So, Nani Maiyaji taught her Anapana. Benazir Bhutto started
practising right away and found it very calming. She said that she had not
slept for days and after the session of Anapana, she wanted to take a nap
because she felt so tranquil. We waited while she had a restful
sleep. After a few hours, she emerged looking refreshed and happy. We
explained to her the salient aspects of Vipassana: a means out of human
suffering and misery; not a ritual of an organized religion but an art of
living. Vipassana involves no conversion from one religion to another and is
open to all without any barrier of caste, creed or gender. The technique helps
people control unruly minds and cleanse them of impurities like fear, anger,
hatred, ill will, animosity, greed, passion and restlessness. Vipassana teaches
how to diminish the ego and to find truth about oneself and to achieve inner
peace.
We talked a bit more about Vipassana and where she could possibly sit through a
full 10-day course. We also gave her books, tapes and videos. By this time, it
was late in the evening and the last flight from Islamabad to Karachi was about
to leave. We rushed to the airport. Upon the prime ministers order, two seats
had been kept for us and the plane took off as soon as we boarded it. When we
landed at Karachi that night, we learnt that there had been a military coup and
Benazir Bhutto had been deposed. We had been the last visitors she met as prime
minister. Last week, as news of her assassination came in, I was filled with
sadness, but took solace in the fact that she had learned Anapana, an important
part of the Vipassana technique. May she be happy and peaceful in her heavenly
abode.
Roop Jyoti helps run Vipassana Centers in Nepal and is ex-minister of state for
finance.
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