parts of the country and visited many branches of the Order and some unaffiliated centres. In 1998, he visited various places in the US, Canada, Japan and Singapore. He also went to Malaysia, Fiji, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh at different times. In all those places, he spread the message of Ramakrishna, Sarada Devi, Vivekananda and Vedanta and also gave spiritual initiation (mantra diksha) to many seekers. Atmasthananda was elected as the 15th President of the Ramakrishna Math and the Ramakrishna Mission on 3 December 2007. Inspired by the Teachings of Swami Vivekananda since his young days, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi wanted to join the mission to become a monk. He spent some time in the Rajkot ashram, where he closely interacted with Swami Atmasthananda. He told Modi that "sanyas was not for him and his work was among people and not in seclusion." Personal life Born Satyakrishna Bhattacharya, he was the eldest of seven brothers and three sisters. His second brother Jyotikrishna also joined the Ramakrishna Order as Swami Yuktananda. A sister, Arati, also became a sanyaasini named as Achyutaprana. Two other brothers who took sanyaas are Manindra krishna as Kalikrishnananda and Sourendrakrishna as Swami Gopeshananda. Death Atmasthananda died on 18 June 2017. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed his condolence in a tweet saying: "The demise of Swami Atmasthananda ji is a personal loss for me. I lived with him during a very important period of my life." References Biographical Information on Atmasthananda can be found here: Belur Math Website Prabuddha Bharata, January 2008 (Large PDF file) External links The contemplative life, article by Atmasthananda 1919 births 2017 deaths Presidents of the Ramakrishna Order Monks of the Ramakrishna Mission