Sri Satyananda Dev was commonly called as Thakur by his devotees. He is believed to be reincarnation of God. Thakur Sri Satyananda Dev was born on 24th February 1902 at 1.50 a.m. He was born in Lalbazar Kolkata in a pious Brahmin family. His father was Sri Mahendranath Mukhopadhyay who was the then police commissioner in Kolkata. He was a very honest and a dutiful officer. His mother was Smt. Kasishwari Devi who was also a very pious and a religious lady. She at the instance of Fakir Bilayat Ali observed hard penance at a burning ghat in Birbhum for quite some time. Kasishwari Devi had the darshan of Ma Bhavatarini in Amabosya the New Moon Day and she got the blessings of the Almighty Mother. Mother told her that Kasishwari Devi would have a son who would be a great saint. Thakur had 3 brothers and 2 sisters. They were Satyasadhan, Satyabrata, Satyaniranjan, Satyabati and Satyashila. Satyabrata the second son was known as Sri Satyananda Dev.
Swami Satyananda Dev was an ardent follower of Swami Abhedananda, who was one of the sixteen direct disciple of Ramakrishna Paramhansha. Swami Abhedananda wanted Thakur to take over the charge of the temple at Darjeeling. But Thakur’s parent did not allow him to go there. They requested Abhed Swami to allow Thakur to practise his religion here .Accordingly he performed all the religious rites and penance in the attic of the house in Kashipur and then at Siuri. He did meditation for 13 years. He did not sleep in those days and ate very less. He then got his Sannyas from the Almighty mother Maa Bhavotarini herself. It is the almighty mother who gave him the name Satyananda. Later his other family members took diksha from him ,which is very rare and strikingly similar to Gautam Buddha.
Thakur's first public appearance was in Siuri in the year 1939. Thakur then established his first Aashram in Siuri in the house given by his father. He soon then had gathered 100 Sannyasis and Sannyasinnis. All of them together led a life of hard work and penance. Thakur taught each one of them to practise atleast 6 hours of jaap and then to devote rest of the time in servicing the suffering masses.
Thakur also believed in the all round development of mothers-women. He taught and educated all the Sanyasinnis ,they all came at a very tender age of 12 or 13 years. So Thakur took the responsibility of teaching them. They all were at par excellence. Some could write poems and songs while others could translate Sanskrits scripts to Bengali. They all were trained in their own respective field. All Sanyasinnis were called as Ma. Anyone associated with the Aashram called them Ma. They observed all religious rites and penance like those of men folk. They all worshipped Gopalji. Thakur called Archana Puri Ma (Manas kanya) and Geeta Puri Ma as Saraswati and Laxshmi.
Everyday Thakur sat with his devotees and interacted with them. He answered the queries of the devotees. The preceptor and the devotees discussed on many issues related to religion, philosophy etc. Thakur believed that to awaken the youth of our country education is very much needed. So he established many schools and colleges for the development of the youth. He believed that the youth should go to foreign countries to learn but should come back to India to serve motherland. His focus was character building. He believed that if the youth of our country have strong belief and confidence than they can do anything big. Thakur always told to be like a banyan tree so that everybody can get shelter in the shadow.
Thakur was a sensitive poet and philosopher. He authored many books and songs. His major books were World Philosophy, World Psychology, World Ethics along with other books, poems and songs. He composed many dramas. He himself was quite well versed in the classical music. He even composed Thumri on Ma Bhavotarini. Naachta Kali Dulari...He composed divine tune also...
Sri Thakur left for his heavenly abode in 1969.
