KAIKHUSHURU BOMAN IRANI
Boman K. Irani was married to Baily’s sister, Tehmina. Bomanji became a disciple of Meher Baba, and he, his wife and their two daughters had been staying at Meherabad since 1925. A few years later, when Baba went to Persia in 1929, the Bomanji family was left alone in Meherabad. Bomanji became friendly with Satya Mang who helped the family a great deal. Satya Mang also kept watch for some years at Meherabad.
Some of his events with Meher Baba are produced below:
In 1926, once, Baba suddenly showed up at eleven o’clock and found Behramji and Bomanji quarreling. Baba pacified them, though he was disturbed to find them fighting in his absence. Frustrated, Baba declared, “From today, Sakya (one of the Mahars) will serve food to all and all must eat it without harboring any thought of caste or community.
Those who don’t like it should leave Meherabad!” Thus on the pretext of being annoyed with Behramji and Bomanji, Baba administered the final touches to his work of eradicating all prejudicial differences of caste between His mandali.
Bomanji was living in Meherabad with his family. Soon after Baba returned, a quarrel broke out between Bomanji’s wife Tehmina (Baily’s sister) and their servant Bhagu (Jamadar’s wife). Bomanji stopped Bhagu from coming to work and instead gave the job to Walu. The next day, neither of the servants turned up, as both were friends from Arangaon.
The matter was brought to Baba’s attention and He criticized Bomanji, “You stopped one and allowed the other to come? When you take food by the mouth, you eliminate the waste from the anus. One opening is good; another is bad. But you forget that both are necessary and life is impossible without them.
“Similarly, even if Bhagu were bad from your point of view, she is also good. She is sincere and has love. Although she has a mean temperament and is inquisitive by nature, she is good; and because of that, I have kept her at Meherabad. Do you remember how I once slapped Naja on account of her?
“Everyone is pozuli (nosy), especially you Iranis! When you yourselves are like that, why find fault with others?”
In 1930, after inspecting the grounds, Baba became even more annoyed with Bomanji for not having watered the mango trees at Meherabad. He rebuked him, “For My own special reasons, I planted these seeds. Why were you so careless about the saplings? I kept you here to look after the management of Meherabad. Is this the way you are doing it? If so, I will have to find someone else.” Baba instructed him not to have anything further to do with the garden and trees at Meherabad.
On the final day of His fast, 10th September 1960, another program for the poor was held from 8:45 until 10:15 A.M. in mandali hall at Meherazad. Baba bowed to 220 poor persons (167 men and 53 women) from eight surrounding villages, and handed ten rupees to each as prasad. Noshir Irani and his brother Boman were permitted to witness the proceedings as they had donated the Rs.2,200 amount given as prasad, as per Baba’s request of them. (“Baba has no money to give to the poor,” Eruch had written them, “and give he must!”).