This incident occurred around 1985. One morning, a man arrived at Narendra’s house and loudly called from the outer room, “Bapusaheb!” After a pause, he again called, “Sister-in-law, I have come!” The voice was unfamiliar. Narendra went out to see who it was. The man, slightly younger than him, said, “Bapusaheb, do you recognize me?” Narendra could not recall him at all. He invited him to sit. The man said, “You will not remember me, but I remembered you.” When Narendra asked his name, he replied, “Dr. Ramesh Kasture.” He added that he lived in Akola and explained his purpose: “You would not know me, so let me introduce myself. I have come because Vyankatanath Maharaj ordered me to come. Some days ago, when I visited Devgaon, Maharaj showed me your physical form in a vision. He told me your address and said I must meet you.”
Hearing this, Narendra became very curious. The man continued with an unusual and humorous story. He said that he ran a medical clinic in Patur that was always crowded because his diagnosis and treatment were accurate and inexpensive. He had no belief in saints or religious practices. Though there was a monastery of Ramchandranath Maharaj in the region, he had never gone for darshan.
One day, several villagers rushed to him saying hot water was flowing toward the village. They said people were giving Ramchandra Maharaj a bath by pouring cold well-water through a 3-inch pipe, yet the water flowing down from his body was extremely hot — even kilometres away. Curious, he went to check. The water on the road truly was hot. When he arrived at the bath area, Ramchandranath Maharaj immediately stopped the bath, went inside a room and locked the door. His disciple announced, “Doctor Kasture has come,” but Maharaj said, “Send everyone away. I will not open the door.” After waiting a long time, Kasture returned home without darshan.
Gradually, however, he came closer to Maharaj and a relationship developed. One day Ramchandranath Maharaj said, *“Vyankatanath Maharaj has instructed me to hand over my spiritual work to you.”* At that moment, Kasture saw — with open eyes — Vyankatanath Maharaj in their old traditional attire, exactly as they had appeared decades earlier. Narendra confirmed the description; Kasture had never met Maharaj physically.
As time passed, Ramchandranath Maharaj declared, *“In one and a quarter months, I will enter Samadhi. After that, Dr. Kasture will continue my work.”* A worldly doctor with no spiritual inclination had to be prepared in one and a quarter months to sit on a Guru’s seat. This immense task was undertaken by Ramchandranath Maharaj out of obedience to Vyankatanath Maharaj’s instruction.
During this short period, Kasture progressed so rapidly that he became spiritually fit for the responsibility. He wondered why Vyankatanath Maharaj had chosen him. But Maharaj, being the 15th Nath in the lineage of Matsyendranath, had the full authority and inner vision to decide. He saw the future and guided accordingly.
Kasture’s mother too had once been blessed by Vyankatanath Maharaj. Ramchandranath Maharaj himself was a Nath Yogi of extraordinary attainment. People said he lived like an avadhut — smoking hundreds of bidis one after another, generating so much internal heat that he would cool himself by levitating horizontally ten feet above the ground, unsupported, while people walked beneath him. Such was his yogic power.
Considering the Nath tradition’s spiritual succession, Vyankatanath Maharaj instructed that Dr. Ramesh Kasture should continue Ramchandra Maharaj’s lineage. Although Vyankatanath Maharaj worked primarily in another region, he made this decision keeping the entire Nath Panth in mind.
After preparing him internally, Ramchandranath Maharaj placed Kasture on the bhanḍāra (spiritual seat). Shortly thereafter, he entered Sanjeevani Samadhi. Thus unfolds the remarkable story of two great Yogis — Ramchandranath Maharaj and Vyankatanath Maharaj — as narrated later by their successor, Dr. Kasture himself.