Shuddhananda who was the fifth president of the Ramakrishna Order, was a direct monastic disciple of Vivekananda. He joined the Ramakrishna Math in 1897. He became a trustee of Ramakrishna Math and a member of the governing body of Ramakrishna Mission in May 1903. He also took up the editorship of the Bengali magazine called Udbodhan for sometime. He was appointed as the secretary of the math and the mission in 1927 and as the vice president in 1937. In 1938, he became the president of the order. His tenure was short, as he died in 1938. He is renowned in the literary circles to have translated most of Vivekananda's original works from English to Bengali. Pre Monastic Life Shuddhananda's pre-monastic name was Sudhir Chandra Chakravarty. He was born as son of Ashutosh Chakravarty in 1872 in Serpentine Lane in Calcutta. He studied at the City College of the University of Calcutta, prior to joining the Alambazar Math of the Ramakrishna Mission in 1897. He had a group of friends all of whom became directly associated with Ramakrishna order in the later years as monks and all were disciples of Vivekananda. They were Khagen or Vimalananda, Kalikrishna or Virajananda, Haripada or Swami Bodhānanda Puri and Govinda (Shukul) or Swami Atmānanda Puri. He spent most of his time in spiritual pursuits and reading and discussing religious books in the company of his friends. They also formed a debating club. At this stage Sudhir was interested in the practice of Yoga and learnt it from Panchanan Bhattacharya or Arya Mission, a disciple of Shyamacharan Lahiri or Lahiri Mahasaya. Introduction to Ramakrishna Order In 1890, he came in contact with devotees of Ramakrishna at the Baranagar Math and Kankurgachi Yogodyan. Yogananda was the spiritual mentor of the group. Advaitananda provided him with a copy of the Teachings of Sri Ramakrishna, a small book compiled by Sureshchandra Dutta, a householder devotee of Ramakrishna. Introduction to Vivekananda and his teachings Sudhir, like other youths of his time in India, was greatly inspired by the stirring lectures of Vivekananda in the Parliament of World Religions, 1893 and elsewhere in the West. He closely followed the lectures published in Indian Mirror Newspaper and became attracted to the ideals of Vivekananda. Sudhir also went to Sealdah Station to meet Vivekananda the day he set foot in Calcutta and also went to meet him in the house of Pashupati