Bhagoji Shinde

Bhagoji Shinde suffered from leprosy, and most people kept away from him. Baba, however, kept him close as his personal attendant. Bhagoji was always near Baba in the Dwarakamai and walked beside him in the processions to the Chavadi, holding the umbrella over his head.

In 1910, on Dhanteras day, Baba suddenly thrust his arm into the dhuni. When devotees pulled him out, his hand was badly burnt. Baba explained that a blacksmith's wife far away had let her child slip into a furnace, and he had pulled the child out. Nanasaheb Chandorkar brought a famous doctor from Bombay, but Baba refused treatment from him. He allowed only Bhagoji to dress the wound.

Every day Bhagoji massaged the burnt hand with ghee, wrapped it in a leaf and bandaged it. He continued this service until the Mahasamadhi, even after the burn had healed. Devotees say this was Baba's way of giving a man the world rejected a place of honour beside him, and of washing away his past karma through service.