Preface
1. God and his Incarnations
2. The Puranic Prophecy About Sri Kalki Avatar
3. The Contemporary World Crisis
4. Mankind's Role - Expectations from the Kalki Avatar
5. Sai Devotees' Claim : Sri Sathya Sai is Kalki Avatar
Evidences & Conclusion
For the last five thousand years, the Hindus have been firmly believing in the concept of Avatar i.e., Incarnation of God coming to earth to redeem the mankind assuming different forms. Although countless incarnations of God have appeared from time to time in India, (the Bhagavath mentions 22 important incarnations), yet the most important or Principal Incarnations of God Vishnu, who are held in very high esteem, are ten. These are called the Dashavatars-the Ten Principal Incarnations. Many believe that the Bhagavath had first of all mentioned these Dashavatars, but some scholars have discovered that some of the Dashavatars had earlier been mentioned even in the Vedas which were created much before the Puranas-about 6,000 years back or so.
Only the following Dashavatars were mentioned in our scriptures like Bhagavath, Mahabharatha, Kalki Purana and others :
1. Matsya Avatar (God incarnated as Fish)
2. Kurma Avatar (God incarnated as Tortoise)
3. Varaha Avatar (God incarnated as Boar)
4. Narasimh a Avatar (God incarnated as Half Man-Half Lion)
5. Vaman Avatar (God incarnated as a Dwarf Brahmin)
6. ParsuRama Avatar (God incarnated as ParsuRama with Axe)
7. Rama Avatar (God incarnated as Rama, son of King Dashrath of Ayodhya)
8. Krishna Avatar (God incarnated as Krishna, son of Vasudeva of Mathura)
9. BalaRama Avatar (God incarnated as Balarama, elder brother of Krishna)
10. Kalki Avatar (God to be incarnated as Kalki in future in the Kali Age)
The first nine of these Dashavatars have already appeared and now the coming of the tenth one, the Kalki Avatar, is most eagerly awaited by devout people.
After the advent of Buddha (566 BC-486 BC) Buddhism spread far and wide in India and also abroad. The charismatic personality and teachings of Buddha so much impressed the Hindus (who were earlier against Buddhism) that it ultimately won for Him the place of a great Avatar in the Dashavatars. The Hindus accepted Buddha as the Ninth Dashavatar after Lord Krishna. He was included in the list of the Dashavatars by deleting BalaRama; many scholars club Krishna and BalaRama as one incarnation in order to include Buddha.