Paranjothi Mahan

Jegat Maha Guru Gnanavallal Paranjothi Mahan was born on May 2, 1903 at 8.30 pm in a small village in Kansapuram, part of Virudhunagar district, Srivillputhur in Tamil Nadu.Raised in a poor family, much of Mahan’s life was poverty-ridden. On Nov 11, 1911, at about 11 am, Mahan who was a young boy of 8, noticed a crowd in the village school. Driven by curiosity, he went inside the school and enquired from one of the onlookers about what was going on there. The person told him that the school was having a function to celebrate the coronation of the Emperor in London. The function was organized as a mark of respect to the Emperor.
Mahan then asked him, why it was necessary to have such a huge celebration to respect the Emperor. The onlooker replied to him that the Emperor was the “administrator and the saviour of the people,” and hence the need to respect and bow down to him. Mahan, who had got more curious by now, asked him, “Will the Emperor not bow down to anybody?” The man said, “ Yes he will.... to God.” Instantly Mahan asked him, “Can we see God ?” The man smiled and said, “Yes. You can see God.”
From that moment, Mahan’s thirst for God only grew multifold, for on the one hand he knew God existed and on the other he did not know how to see HIM. His thirst prompted him to undertake severe penance in the form of practice of yoga, chanting of hymns, fasting and many arduous ways to see God. For a great number of days he toiled with just one objective - to see God.
Meanwhile years rolled by and in 1918 he went to Rangoon to make a living and worked in a shop. Because of his intense longing for God, he observed several austerities and on many days spent the wee hours of morning in prayer.
On a Milad-i-Nabi day, he met a saint, who had actually been watching him in deep prayer for several days. They started conversing with each other and as days passed, a cordial relationship developed. On 7.1.1938, while both were involved in a discussion, Mahan asked about the various spiritual practices that the saint was following. Impressed by now with the intense longing for God that Mahan evinced, the saint gave him initiation at 11.11 pm on the same day and that happened to be the calling for Mahan from the Divine. Within a few minutes of initiation, he plunged into a state of inexpressible experience. 
Following that incident, on 7.7.1938, the saint authorised Mahan to initiate anybody who longed to seek God. Mahan wanted to share what he had experienced with the rest of the world, so he underwent several trials on his own physical body and finally gifted to the world, a simple and practical meditation technique. This meditation can be practised by all including house holders and women folk without having to renounce anything. 
Mahan returned to Madurai in September 1939 and stayed in a separate house for a rent of Rs 7 per month. He started to deliver discourses to the public. Spiritual seekers flocked around him and he started the `PARIPPOORANA PARANJOTHIYIN UYAR GNANA SABHAI'. He initiated anybody and everybody who came to him into Raja Yoga. 
He attained Mahasamadhi on January 7, 1981.