Baha’is celebrate Bab’s birth anniversary in Pune

The city’s Baha’i community commemorated the birth anniversary of the Bab, the first of the two divine teachers central to the founding of their faith.

It was celebrated on Thursday at their centre in Parmar Chambers, near Sadhu Vaswani Chowk. The programme for this event included audio-visual presentations on the life of the Bab.
Eliza Rasiwala, a Pune-based Baha’i said, “In 1884, Bab proclaimed that he was a messenger of god sent to announce the imminent coming of a greater prophet, who would bring teachings for an age of universal peace. Nineteen years later, one of the Bab’s followers, who took the title, Bahaullah, announced that he was that new prophet.’’

The Bab, whose teachings attracted lakhs of followers, was executed in 1850 in a public square in Tabriz, Iran, on the orders of the government. Much later, his remains were entombed on Mount Carmel in Haifa (Israel), and his shrine is now a place of pilgrimage for Baha’is.

Baha’is view the world’s major religions as part of a single, progressive process through which god reveals his will to humanity.