Priya Nath wrote to several universities in the world amongst which were Case Institute of Technology, Yale University and Harvard University in America, and Cambridge and Oxford in England. In the meanwhile he began appearing for interviews for scholarships abroad. His simplicity and innocence were such, despite his brilliant academic record, that during a get-together of boys who were being interviewed at St.Stephen’s College at Delhi for the Rhodes Scholarship, he began praising the qualities of a contender for the scholarship. The interviewer was so impressed that he chose that particular boy instead of Priya Nath!
Priya Nath was called for a Commonwealth Scholarship at Lucknow. The interview was to be held at the Carlton Hotel there. At first Shri Nathji and Mateshwari had been reluctant to allow Priya Nath to go alone because he had never travelled alone in his life, yet they agreed when Priya Nath insisted.
Priya Nath went in a train for the first time from Delhi to Lucknow. He discovered how lonely, dull and insipid trains were, when Shri Nathji was not there. Even the Railway Stations and the towns and cities appeared to lose meaning without the presence of Shri Nathji.
Shri Nathji had told Priya Nath of his great devotee of the 1940’s, Shri Ranjit Singh, who was the owner of the Carlton Hotel. It was in his house, Pleasance, at Mussoorie that Shri Nathji’s cars had often been kept. Priya Nath met the man who was pleasantly surprised to meet Shri Nathji’s son. However he did not offer him the hospitality of his hotel saying that it was full, and Priya Nath immediately booked a room in another hotel close by. The interview went beautifully, but was probably made infructuous by Ranjit Singh’s helpful gesture in talking to the interviewer and recommending Priya Nath afterwards. Priya Nath returned to Delhi soon thereafter and caught a chill on the train.
During those days there was a scholarship for Zurich University. It was sponsored by the Government of India. Only one person was to be selected from the whole of India. He would be sent for a four-year course of studies at Zurich University in Switzerland and then would have to return to serve the Government in any post they chose. The successful applicant would be called upon to execute a bond that he would be obliged to serve the Government of India after returning from Switzerland.
The interviewers were very happy with Priya Nath. One of them even went so far as to say, “Very good”, whenever Priya Nath answered any difficult technical question.
When the interviewer asked Priya Nath the last final question: “What is your ambition in life?”
Priya Nath had replied: “To do something no one has ever done before!”
Little did Priya Nath realise what he had meant when he said these words. However events in later years brought the meaning of his words before him.
Deep down in Priya Nath’s heart was the feeling that all these material pursuits would bring about an inevitable separation from Shri Nathji and Mateshwari. Although Shri Nathji never imposed his will on the boys, Mateshwari was very keen that Priya Nath secure a good job so as to free Shri Nathji of the obligation of the devotees’ sewa. And it was primarily through her encouragement that Priya Nath pursued the search abroad.
Shri Nathji on his part had been writing to all the people he knew about the prospects of a scholarship abroad for Priya Nath.
He had even written to Chaudhari Hyder Husein of Lucknow, who was the Governor of the Rotary Club at the time. Shri Nathji had convalesced at his house, Dilaram Estate, on Camel’s Back Road, Mussoorie from his arm operation of 1943.
As always, Shri Nathji continued to play the part of the ever-loving ever-helpful and self-sacrificing father for both Pran Nath and Priya Nath. It was as if he had oriented his life for them. Truly Shri Nathji was not only Ghulam Rue Zameen, the Servant of the Earth for the people of the world, he was serving Mateshwari, Pran Nath and Priya Nath with equal devotion as well.