NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday inaugurated the Chinmaya Amrit Mahotsav Global Sammelan in New Delhi and, in a moment that blended technology with spirituality, interacted with the holographic avatar of Swami Chinmayananda, the founder of the Chinmaya Mission, who died in 1993.
The three-day gathering at Bharat Mandapam brought together more than 9,000 participants from India and abroad, marking the culmination of year-long celebrations commemorating seventy-five years of the Chinmaya Mission. The organisation, founded by Swami Chinmayananda in 1951, works to make the wisdom of Vedanta and the Bhagavad Gita accessible to people across the world, and its anniversary gathering drew delegates from some thirty countries.
The highlight of the inaugural session was the Prime Minister's conversation with the holographic representation of the spiritual leader, a technology that projects a realistic three-dimensional digital human capable of responding through voice-activated commands. During the exchange, Mr Modi sought the spiritual leader's blessings for the work he wishes to undertake in the years ahead.
"It was my great fortune that I met you, and today I want you to bless me for the work I wish to do," the Prime Minister said to the avatar. The holographic figure responded by expressing happiness at seeing him become Prime Minister and conveyed its support, saying, "India is with you, Narendra."
Addressing the gathering afterwards, Mr Modi described the occasion as a unique spiritual experience and expressed gratitude to the saints whose blessings he said he had received. "It is another kind of spiritual experience. This is a blessing from our saints for me. The Chinmaya Mission is not merely an institution; it represents 'Chinmaya Vichar'," he said, using the Hindi word for thought or philosophy.
Explaining the significance of the occasion, the Prime Minister said that the word 'Chinmaya' symbolised immortality, making the Chinmaya Amrit Mahotsav at Bharat Mandapam particularly meaningful. "The use of technology here has made this experience even more lively. Seeing the divine presence of Chinmaya Ji through his hologram, I felt as if I had travelled back 33 years," he said.
The reference was to his own first meeting with Swami Chinmayananda, which Mr Modi recalled in detail. He said he had met the spiritual leader around February or March 1993 in Vadodara, when he went to invite him to the centenary celebrations of the Parliament of the World's Religions in Chicago.
According to the account the avatar itself gave during the exchange, the spiritual leader had told him at the time that he was growing old and that the responsibility of carrying the work forward would have to fall on Hindu youth.
"For a moment, I felt as though I had gone back to that time. For me, this is an emotional moment," Mr Modi said, thanking the Chinmaya Mission for organising the event. He recalled that Swami Chinmayananda had accepted the invitation and travelled to the United States to encourage people to participate in the Chicago gathering, but had passed away in San Diego in August 1993, just a couple of weeks before the event itself.
"When the Parliament was held in September, we all deeply missed Gurudev," he said.
The Prime Minister also used the platform to speak about the challenges facing Indian society. He called for collective efforts to unite society against divisive forces and to promote self-reliance, saying that new challenges had emerged in recent decades that must be addressed. "We must unite society against divisive forces. We must inspire citizens toward self-reliance, and we must connect every individual to the vision of a developed India by 2047. For these objectives, we must become more proactive," he said.
He drew a link between the mission's journey and the country's own trajectory. When India completes one hundred years of independence in 2047, he noted, the Chinmaya Mission will also mark its centenary. "This means the centenary journey of Chinmaya Mission and the journey of a developed India will progress together. Therefore, our goals are one, our objectives are one, and we must take this journey forward together," he said.
The Prime Minister also reflected on his own years in public office, saying he had spent twenty-five years serving the nation as head of government to the best of his ability while carrying forward the vision of Chinmayananda. The AI-powered model, for its part, praised Mr Modi, saying India was with him as he worked for the revival of religious places, the strengthening of the economy and for taking on challenges with courage.
The event itself is the centrepiece of the mission's seventy-fifth anniversary year. Over the past decade, the mission has expanded its programmes in spiritual education, youth outreach and community service, and the summit will culminate in a digital Gita study initiative. The gathering is being held over three days and features discourses, cultural programmes and sessions on the application of Vedantic thought to contemporary life.
The use of a holographic avatar of a departed spiritual leader is itself a sign of how religious and cultural organisations are beginning to use new technology. The avatar, built from archival recordings and artificial intelligence, is designed to reproduce the leader's voice and manner of speaking, allowing a new generation that never met him to encounter his teaching in a vivid form.
For the organisers, the moment with the Prime Minister demonstrated that technology can carry a spiritual legacy forward rather than merely preserving it in books and recordings.
For Mr Modi, however, the emphasis was personal rather than technological. He described the exchange as a blessing, and said that the affection and blessings of the spiritual leader had come alive again after more than three decades.
In a speech that moved between memory and mission, he presented the Chinmaya Mission not as a relic of the past but as a partner in the country's future, and the holographic conversation as evidence that some relationships, in his words, do not end with a lifetime.
The gathering also underlines how the Chinmaya Mission has grown from a single teacher's mission into a global movement with centres across continents, and how its message continues to find an audience among young Indians in particular. The Prime Minister's presence at the seventy-fifth anniversary celebrations, and his decision to share a personal memory from 1993 on a public stage, gave the event a character that went beyond ceremony.
It became, in effect, a public reflection on how a teacher's influence can outlast his lifetime, and on how a movement built on ancient texts continues to speak to a country that is changing fast.
(Reporting based on NDTV and Business Standard.)