Puttaparthi Sathya Sai Baba was born as Sathyanarayana Raju on November 23, 1926 to Eswaramma and Peddavenkama Raju Ratnakaram in Puttaparthi, Andhra Pradesh. He has two elder sisters, one elder and one younger brother.

At the age of 14,  Sathya Sai Baba decided to enter God man’s life and since then he was described as the incarnation of God by his devotees. His preachings and practices towards developing a holy life attracted scroes of people and Sathya Sai Baba started Prashanth Nilayam in 1948.

Sathya Sai Baba also indulged in several social welfare activities and apart from India, Sathya Sai Baba had millions of devotees across 135 countries where he even set up Ashrams. A classic example of Sathya Sai Baba's social welfare activity is to provide drinking water to 1.2 million people in the drought-prone Rayalaseema region in Anantapur and also a 200 crore project of donating drinking water to Chennai in 2004. He even established free medical camps and education in more than 166 countries. Sathya Sai Baba and his organizations continued their support in establishing free educational institutions, hospitals, and other charitable works in India and abroad.

Sathya Sai established more than 1,200 Sathya Sai Baba spiritual centers across 114 countries having devotees ranging from high profile people, top politicians, to upper-middle-class, middle class and the poor. He is a cultural icon in India and had devotees starting from Prime Minister, President, etc and by 2002, Sathya Sai Baba had followers across 178 countries.

Like many other sages, Sathya Sai Baba too faced a lot of criticism from the skeptics, who tried to prove Baba's miracles as either fake or sleight of hand. But eventually all their claims proved to be false and Baba's reputation as 'Bhagawan' grew multifold. Baba himself have boldly asserted that "I am beyond the reach of the most intensive enquiry and the most meticulous measurement. Only those who have recognized my love and experienced that love can assert that they have glimpsed my reality. Do not attempt to know me through the external eyes."

Sathya Sai Baba was admitted to the super-specialty hospital at Prashantigram at Puttaparthi on 28 March 2011 following respiration related problems. After 28 days of hospitalization, during which his condition continuously deteriorated, he passed away at 7.40 AM on 24 April 2011.