Early Years
Satchidananda was born in 1914 into a pious and devoted Gounder family at Chettipalayam, a small village in Coimbatore, near Podanur in the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu and was named as C. K. Ramaswamy Gounder. His parents affectionately called him Ramu. He remained a vegetarian all his life and abstained from eating meat at all times. After graduating from an agricultural college, he took a position with his uncle's firm, which imported motorcycles. By the age of 23 he became a manager at India's National Electric Works. During this period he got married and had two children. His wife died five years later. Ramaswamy then left his two young sons with their paternal grandmother and decided to go on a spiritual journey.
Read more about this topic: Satchidananda Saraswati
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