When Bhagavan’s mother attained Mahasamadhi in May 1922, she was interred at the southern foot of the hill. At the suggestion of some devotees, Chinnaswamy and Ramanathan, son of Yoganathan, used to take naivedya to the samadhi each morning and return to Skandasramam at noon after doing puja at the samadhi. Water required for the daily abhishekam was collected from the tank at Palakothu. During the construction of the Samadhi, earth was scooped out by devotees from a place just north of the burial site to provide for the raising of a platform around the Samadhi. The excavation left a small cavity in the earth, which, when a heavy rain came a few days later, was filled up with rainwater.
After the rain, the usual hot dry summer weather returned but the water in the crevice did not dry up; rather, it remained a constant level, clear and clean. When this was noticed by Chinnaswami and Ramanathan’s son, they tried to drain the water from the hole but found that the former water level was soon restored. They took a sample of the water up to Skandashram to show Bhagavan. That evening Bhagavan came down from the hill, inspected the site, and asked them to dig a pit three feet wide and three feet deep. Once done, water began flowing and the site revealed itself to be a spring which, though twelve feet higher than the nearby Pali thirtham, unceasingly bestowed sweet, crystalline water. The spring was christened both ‘Alagamma Tirtha’ and ‘Ramana Thirtha’ and its discovery was commemorated in a Sanskrit verse by Ganapati Muni: “Here is the new Tirtha, remover of all blemishes, at the Samadhi of Mother Saundaryamba, like the stream of pollen from the twin lotus hands of Ramana Maharshi.”
In the course of the years that followed, further excavation was done and the spring which proved to be perennial, never drying up, eventually grew to become a full-service well. As Ashram water needs mounted, the well was further deepened and broadened and, in time conventional quarrying techniques were used in such efforts. Eventually parapet walls of stone and mortar were raised, and a hand-pump was fitted into the well to pump water into a masonry tank. Pipes from the kitchen were fitted to the tank for daily access.
In 1967 further digging was done until the well’s depth reached 45 feet. In 1988 two bore wells were drilled at the Ashram to try and meet the ever-increasing demand for water, especially acute in the summer months. Submersible electric pumps were installed with a large overhead tank. Finally the municipality began providing water service to the Ashram and pipes were laid from Pali Thirtham to provide for the flower gardens. In 2005 a water treatment plant was installed behind the Veda Patsala which serves to recycle all Ashram grey water for garden use. Today Ashram water needs are stable and the Ashram Well is once again being used exclusively for abhishekam in the Mother’s Temple as well as at Sri Bhagavan’s Samadhi Shrine.
