In English
There was a gentleman who had renounced everything and became an ascetic. Once as he sat in meditation on the banks of the river Ganges, a tourist bus came to halt there. The ascetic heard the tourists speaking in Kannada. He at once stopped his meditation and went towards them. “Where do you come from?” he asked them. They replied, “We come from .” The man felt very happy because was the state from which he hailed. He became very fond of the tourists because they came from his own state and spoke his own language. He felt so glad that he made further enquiries. He came to know that they had come from his own district, his own , his own village, and even his own street. They were, in fact, his neighbours! He was swept by a wave of attachment and he enquired about his father. He was informed that his father had died a few years earlier. Hearing this, the ascetic, who thought that he had renounced all attachments, broke down with grief. All his asceticism was useless. is of no avail if attachment to body and kith and kin continues to linger. The physical body has to be dedicated to the performance of for the benefit of others.