KOLKATA, INDIA, November 4, 2007: Swami Gahanananda, 14th president of the Ramakrishna Math and Ramakrishna Mission, passed away today after a prolonged illness. He was 91. Swami Gahanananda, who was admitted to the Ramakrishna Mission Seva Pratisthan hospital here on September 4 with old age problems, breathed his last at 5.35 p.m., hospital sources said. His body would be taken to the Belur Math Headquarters Sunday evening where his cremation would take place on November 5, Math and Mission sources said. He was elected president of the Ramakrishna Math and Ramakrishna Mission in May 2005. Born in Paharpurvilage in Sylhet district (now in Bangladesh) in October, 1916, he joined the Ramakrishna Order in Bhubaneswar in January 1939 at the age of 22. He became the general secretary of the Math and Mission in 1989 and continued in that post for three years till 1992 when he became vice-president of the Order.
HPI adds: Swami Adiswarananda, head of the Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Center of New York for 35 years, also passed away. He succumbed on October 31 to a massive brain hemorrhage. He was born in 1925 in West Bengal, India. After being fully ordained as a monk in 1963, he served the Ramakrishna Order in various capacities as a teacher of religious subjects, and journal editor of Prabuddha Bharata at the Advaita Ashrama at Mayavati, in the Himalayas. In 1968, he was sent to New York to assist Swami Nikhilananda, the founder of the Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Center of New York. In 1973, Swami Adiswarananda assumed the role of minister and spiritual leader of the Center. In his own ministry, Swami Adiswarananda emphasized the need to develop good character, to understand the nature of the mind and the senses, to practice restraint and philosophical discrimination, to work unselfishly, and to fix one’s mind on God.