In plain words
‘Sai Gaṅgā’, which quenched the thirst of the people of Chennai
It is Pārvatī who gives water to the whole world! Īśvara granted her this boon. Gaṅgā is Pārvatī's own form. That is why people worship her as ‘Gaṅgā Devī’. Ten years ago I went to Madras. There, near ‘Red Hills’, is a big tank. They told Me that water is supplied from that tank to the whole of Madras. The devotees sitting with Me in the car. There was no water in the tank itself, so what would it supply! They told Me there had been no water in it for ten years. Children could be seen drinking rainwater that had fallen here and there. It was badly polluted water. They told Me that this very water was used for drinking and for cooking too. ‘Swami, when will water come to this tank?’ they asked. For anything at all, time, karma, cause and duty must come together. I kept this in view. “For ten more years I will not set foot in this Madras. I will come here when I have brought water to the whole of Madras, raised crops through that water, and the people are drinking pure water,” I said. Ten years went by. The other day I went. Wherever you looked, water! That water is used not only for drinking but for growing crops as well.
The British lived in Madras for two hundred years. In those days there were no roads, no cars. They would ride on horseback here, there and everywhere, climb all over the hills and look for where there was water. But even at the very end, when they left, they had not solved the water problem. The rich, who had money, kept having drinking water brought in tankers and drinking it. But, what about the poor people? What would become of the poor? They had no money to have water brought in tankers. One day I put up at Teynampet. Everyone came there. ‘Swami! We have no water to drink,’ they said.