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There are
an astounding number of god men and goddess women in our country who are
little more than con men who get away with accumulating huge amounts of
money and property from gullible devotees.
By T. Rajagopalan
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No
one, however mighty he or she may be, is allowed to board, a plane of
Indian Airlines with a staff in his or her hand. Strictly following
this rule, lAC functionaries flatly declined to allow Swami Avimukteswarananda
Saraswati, the Sankaracharya of Dwarka Peeth, to fly carrying his “holy
danda.” Somehow he managed to enter the aircraft with his long
bamboo stick, a symbol of his spiritual designation, probably by hoodwinking
the operatives at the lower level but the pilot of flight IC-147 put
his foot down at the Mumbai’s Santa Cruz airport and saw to it that
the swami was forcefully evicted from the aircraft before it took off.
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The infuriated
swami said in a stentorian voice, “Our work takes us on flights often.
I have travelled by air 225 times till date but didn’t undergo this
sort of humiliation.” He said further, “The behaviour of the pilot
of the flight which had upwards of 50 per cent foreigners, made me feel
like I was a terrorist. I just wonder what those foreigners must think
of Hindu saints.”
When the
swami met high ranking lAC officials and complained to them about this
episode, they apologised to him verbally for the inconvenience caused
to him, but declined stubbornly to issue him a written apology.
They also
refused to return his fare to him. They told him clearly that he should
have followed the instructions of the persons in charge of the aircraft
and deposited his stick in the cargo compartment. Since he refused to
do so and had also refused to emplane sans that stick, no refund would
be made.
SWINDLERS
SAINTS
Such high-flying
swamis are now dime a dozen in India. When even a Prime Minister of
India touches the feet of a “holy” baba
and sits next to him in an ordinary chair while the baba sits on a king-sized
decorated throne what surprise is there in such holy men claiming special
privileges whether travelling by air or land?
It was
an incongruous spectacle telecast by a TV channel when the late P. V.
Narasimha Rao paid obeisance at the feet of Saibaba at his palatial
Prasanthi Nilayam in Puttaparti in the Anantapur district of Andhra
Pradesh. Again, he sat next to him on the podium in a wooden chair while
outsized mughal, the baba sat on a peacock-like throne.
Saibaba
runs a magnificent ashram at Whitefield in Bangalore and a visit to
this place will convince you beyond doubt that his wealth must run into
thousands of crores of rupees.
It
was reported that on 10 October 2005, on the occasion of the inauguration
of a tourist complex at Puttaparti, the tourism minister who was the
architect of this complex and a devotee of the baba received a gold
or diamond necklace as a gift from this holy man who produced the necklace
from his hand just as he produced a gold wristlet and gifted it to Sachin
Tendulkar when he called on him. If an ordinary mortal could procure
an audience with this baba, he will also get a gift from his hand, but
it will be “sacred” ash to be applied on the forehead.
Not far
from my residence in Hyderabad is the fabulous abode of Bala Saibaba,
a pocket edition of Satya Saibaba in almost all respects. This smaller
version of Satya Saibaba, almost half a century younger than his senior,
recently agreed to be interviewed by a Telugu TV channel in Hyderabad.
The interviewer,
a fearless and forthright woman, frankly asked him how he, who hailed
from a lower middle-class family in Kurnool, could amass such huge wealth
as was manifest from his significant abode and its furnishings as also
from his immense landed property which is worth crores of rupees.
The small
baba cleared his throat and replied that all the wealth had come from
his foreign disciples. The baba’s discomfiture increased when she
asked him whether he could materialise a pumpkin for her from his hand
just as he materialised gold chains for his affluent devotees and ash
for lesser mortals. The baba squirmed and just laughed away the question.
This Bala
(meaning child) Saibaba had created a trust named Bhagwan Sri Bala Saibaba
Trust and procured for it 86 acres of prime land at Kondapur (near Hyderabad)
in Ranga Reddy district of AP. His devotees gave him this land when
told it was for public welfare and religious activity, but the baba
tried to dispose of this land.
M. Siva
Prasad, a former trustee, filed a writ petition in the AP High Court
complaining alienation of valuable land by the trust. Senior counsel
S. Ramachandra Rao, appearing for the petitioner, contended that under
the guise of a religious institution, crores of public money was being
swindled by the trust and its members.
DEVOTEES
DUPED
Mata Amritanandamayi,
originally Sudhamani, who hails from a lower middle-class family in
Kerala, is now worth crores of rupees. She has
countless number of devotees, both Indians and foreigners. She has paid
religious visits to all the continents save Antarctica. During her visits
to the USA, the UK, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Spain,
Ireland, Switzerland, Holland, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Mauritius
- the list is unending - she was received at airports by her enthusiastic
disciples.
Her stores
stock everything from DVDs and VHS tapes, priced between $15 and $27,
to books, incense sticks and even queer items like “Essential Oil”
priced at $10 and Amma shower gel and body lotions costing $9 a bottle.
A lucrative
pharmacy which is minting money, named Divya Yog Pharmacy and owned
by Swamy Ramdev was in the news in January 2006. The CPI-M member of
Rajya Sabha, Brinda Karat, had alleged that this pharmacy used animal
parts in its ayurvedic preparations.
This led
to a violent clash between the supporters of the swami who received
handsome payments from their “guru” for supporting him and a large
number of CPI-M members outside the party headquarters in Gol Market,
New Delhi. This clash took place when the former staged a demonstration
against levelling such an allegation by the CPI-M MP.
The All-India
Democratic Women’s Association (AIDWA) vehemently condemned the protests
against Brinda Karat and said, “It is a fact that employees working
in the Ayurvedic drug manufacturing factory, run by Swamy Ramdev, many
of whom are poor women, have been protesting since last year against
violation of labour laws there.
They had
met Brinda in connection with these problems and told her about various
materials like animal bones and horns being used in the manufacture
of medicines without “their users being made aware about this.”
A Telugu
TV channel, while telecasting the profile of Ramdev on the night of
14 April 2006, showed him stating that he started his sanyasa on 9 March
2005. Thus, it is seen that in the course of just a year he has amassed
huge wealth in the shape of mammoth buildings housing his huge ashram,
a sprawling yoga centre, a large factory to churn out his herbal preparations,
fields where the herbs are grown and so on. All this was shown in the
telecast.
TRANSCENDENTAL
TRASH
A fake
baba who claimed that he could cure any ailment including cancer and
AIDS through his divine eyesight, Goroju Kanaka Chari, whose disciples
included the renowned industrialist of Andhra Pradesh, G. S. Raju and
some highlevel Telugu Desam leaders, was arrested by the Machavaram
police when he failed to prove his divine powers during a demonstration
at the government general hospital in the presence of senior medical
specialists.
The doctors
had challenged him to prove his divine powers to cure any ailment. Following
his failure when a complaint was lodged that he was a cheat who was
swindling the gullible public, the police arrested him. It
was reported that Chaitanya Charan Acharya Maharaj, chief
priest of Lakshya Chandi temple in Patna, vanished with a bag
containing Rs 10 lakh from temple donations. This sent shock waves among
other priests and devotees alike. A police team was immediately dispatched
to Cuttack to trace him as it was believed that he had escaped to that
city in Orissa.
The corporate
holdings of the bearded Maharshi Yogi, the proponent of transcendental
meditation will take your breath away. They include land worth crores
of rupees, posh hotels, publishing houses that sell his publications
for lakhs of rupees and even a TV channel to popularise his transcendental
meditation. He is also planning to create a huge spiritual theme park
spending an astronomical sum.
Sometime
ago, a Tamil TV channel telecast a report about a woman tantrik and
her mother, both fierce-looking. With bedraggled hair, forehead smeared
with ash and sporting a large vermilion mark, it was claimed that the
younger woman ‘was the incarnation of Kali Mata of Kolkata and so
she was called Kolkata Kali. They said that she could cure any ailment
with her divine powers. According to the report she had been attracting
a huge crowd and was having a field day, filling her coffers.
FAKES FLEECE
The Jana
Vignana Vedica (JVV) and the Federation of Atheists, Rationalists and
Humanists Association (FARA) in Hyderabad had asked the Government to
make it mandatory for these fake godpersons to declare their properties
and pay taxes for the huge incomes they obtain.
These
two organisations had urged the government to investigate the financial
affairs of these men and women who exploit the faith of gullible folk
with their so-called miraculous powers. They asked the government to
seize their assets and confiscate them if they were proved to have been
illicitly acquired.
At a press
conference there was a demonstration of miracles by Narendra Nayak,
a rationalist hailing from Mangalore who was teaching biotechnology
at the Manipal Academy of Higher Education. The demonstration drew wild
applause from the huge audience which consisted of atheists and rationalists.
The rationalist
produced currency notes and created gold rings and made them vanish
by sleight of hand and displayed the “water of India” trick in which
some babas “walk” on a sheet of water.
Narendra
Nayak who has given hundreds of such demonstrations in a couple of decades,
repeated his stern challenge that he would bequeath all his property
to anyone who could kill him employing the black magic that is notorious
in many AP villages, going by the name of Banamati. May his tribe increase
to wipe out such fake babas and ridiculous superstitions.
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