Dog accompanies cremation procession of sadhvi

Surat: While faithfulness of dogs are unquestionably the highest among human being’s pets, this dog in Surat, however, surprised all with his tenacity of purpose while walking alongside a sadhvi’s funeral palanquin.
A 100-year-old sadhvi of the Jain community, Piyush Varsha Shreeji Maharajsaheb, passed away on Monday due to old age at Rameshwaram apartment near G D Goenka School in Vesu. When the mortal remains were being taken in a procession, a stray dog started walking alongside the palanquin, with dogged determination.
For, when people started noticing it and even tried to physically remove the dog from the path, it did not protest, but came back again to its original position. It walked all the way to the Umra crematorium — a distance of around 5 km.
Story doesn’t end there. It waited patiently till the cremation was over and didn’t protest when it was brought back in a car to Vesu. Not once did it bark or even disturb anyone, onlookers said.
“We were shocked and surprised to see the dog join the procession. It started walking under the palanquin. We lifted it twice and put it away from the procession, but found it to be back in the same position as soon as we started walking,” said Pritesh Shah, a volunteer in Palkhi Group that assists in taking out the cremation procession of Jain monks in the city.
Devotees claimed that the dog did not react as protest when it was picked up and cast aside twice. Nor did it disturb the rituals in the crematorium and even silently accompanied them back home in a car.
A devotee of the Sadhviji, Sanjay Mehta, told TOI, “I have participated in several cremation processions of sadhvis and monks but never seen such a love of some animal."
Sadhviji, who had renounced the materialistic world around 39 years ago, was staying at the apartment for the past two months and daily went out to the nearby derasar for prayers. She had been residing in the city for over one-and-a-half years.