harikumar1964's blog

For an outsider, Kerala has always been a land of immense beauty and a place  known for its high level of literacy and its intelligentsia.  It is the land where communists came to power for the first time through ballot box. In this land of supposedly left leaning people,  it is but natural to expect a life style firmly based on logics and rationale. And once upon a time back in the 70s & 80s this was to certain extend true. And it was expected that  the advent of information explosion through IT and Cable television would only further cement  the logical and rational mindset of the Malayalees.   But what we see these days hints something else.

Within the last couple of decades,  a number of godmen and women sprouted all along the tiny state proclaiming themselves the true incarnation of god offering a variety of spectacles ranging from marital bliss to cure for the terminally ill to  destruction of enemy to the most outrageous of them all- vision of god. Certain groups claimed that they predicted the 2004 Tsunami- Well to even the average scientifically minded Indian, Tsunami was totally an unknown phenomenon till that fateful boxing day morning. Others claimed predicting Gujrat Earthquake, and still others something else.  In the earlier days, the so called godmen used to produce vibhuti9holy ash), Ladoo and Seiko watches from thin air and give it to his most beloved devotees and those fence sitters. But since PC Sorcar and other magicians started emulating their deeds with finesse, these acts looked more and more mundane and  lost its appeal. But fortunately or unfortunately, by that time those godmen reached a position of invincibility with such political clout that they no more needed such silly acts to entice devotees.

Now this put the next generation of wannabes in trouble.  Simple magic won’t do the trick. They have to explore unchartered avenues. The easiest was astrological and similar predictions. It doesn’t require much expertise. All you need is a few accomplices who would acknowledge their claim of predictions of calamities!  Here again Life’s uncertainties is the area most exploited.

The recent deluge of expose of the godmen (sic!) leaves one wondering- how come so many of them were caught doing mischief  simultaneously. Why all of a sudden , all  these so called noble messiahs of the distressed  turned evil or is it that their evil deeds were covered up by the people in power? Was the administration slumbering till yesterday?

Being an Indian, when talk of Godmen, the first name that jumps into  mind is that of Sai Baba of Puttaparthi( I deliberately avoided Satya as I am not sure of the aptness of the term for him).  In the earlier phase, he was a magician par excellence. His devotees used to spread stories of his turning water  into petrol when the petrol of the vehicle in which he was travelling ran out of fuel with no pumps in the vicinity (to which a famous rationalist once questioned “ if he can do that, then why he can’t ride on a car without petrol?”) to falling vibhutis (Holy ash) and flowers from the photographs kept in the devotees’ house. After having acquired a devotee following unprecedented and unparalleled in the recent history- people like prime ministers, presidents, Supreme court chief Justices, top cricketers, and musicians – he stopped performing magics. Now he gives only Darshan and satsangs  and  some of developmental and charity work with much fanfare.   There were so many allegations of misdeeds in his ashrams including some of his deserted devotees accusing him of Homosexual tendencies. In the 90s a boy studying in the school run by him at his Ashram was killed by security guards under dubious circumstances. Unlike in the case of lesser known godmen, these cases were never investigated and all hushed up. The famous illusionist PC Sorcar Jr. Challenged him many times to perform the divine act before him but he was never given audience by Baba. Finally Sorcar managed an appointment (personal darshan) with him under a pseudonym. And the story goes like this – when Baba greeted him with Ladoos realized from thin air, Sorcar reciprocated with Rosogollas realized from thin air. Baba immediately summoned his security guards and ordered to throw him out of Ashram. (I don’t know whether this is a true story). My cousin who is presently the Ambassador of India to Egypt, told me an incident. In the 90s when he was in Mauritias , he escorted a Mauritian Minister to India. This Minister, being a devotee, included a visit to Baba in his itenary. My cousin decided not to join the entourage. Citing some  assignment elsewhere, left the group, and then went to the Ashram as a commoner. Whereas the Mauritian entourage got a grand welcome and special treatment with  special darshan, my cousin was treated the way a commoner is treated- standing in the open ground along with others for Baba’s darshan and that’s all. He told me that had Baba been so divine, he would have recognized me as someone important. He was appalled at the VIP treatment to some privileged  by someone who proclaims himself as god. (Texts say before god everybody is equal – but unfortunately some are more than equal).

Next on the bigwig list is our own Mata Amritananda Mayi- the embracing mother. Coming from a very lowly background, her rise to superstardom in spirituality is nothing short of phenomenal. My cousin ( of the earlier paragraph) says she is the only godmen/women who impressed him with simplicity and down to earth demeanour.  But here also she rose to the top by means of claims of her supernatural powers. It is rumoured that the person next to her in the hierarchy (Amrita swaroopananda) is actually running the show- as you would accept it is truly a show. The satsangs is planned in such a way to create mass hysteria – which is no different from the hysteria generated in the shows of Michael Jackson. And my brother, once visited her ashram. His GM was a great devotee of Amma. They met Amrita swaroopananda on the way, and his GM prostrated before him to get blessings, so also others in the entourage. But my brother restricted himself to  just  Namaste with folded hands. My brother still remembers Amrita swaroopananda’s glance towards him filled with  a lot of disdain and anger while reciprocating. When all the small godmen were getting exposed, Amrita swaroopananda wrote an article in Malayalam daily “Mathrubhumi” regarding the transparency of running their sect.  But the fact is that in some of the schools run by the ashram, teachers are paid a third of their salary, while forcing them to sign receipts of the full amount. And recently there was an agitation planned. Do you call this transparency?

Next on the list of super godmen is Sri Sri Ravishankar- even though his disciples would disagree- and rightly so. He never claims any godly powers. But it is his disciples who elevate him to the level of god. He propagates the message of human well being through art of living. But this well being is accessible to only the rich. And making him guru has become  more the need of the hour for the upwardly mobile to establish a peer group than need of the spirit. Except for the extravagant setup of his ashram and living, nothing adverse has emerged of him so far. So far so good.

Now let us focus our attention on the large no of not so fortunate godmen. Their prominence has been local- the main reason for their vulnerability. The protection they get from local who’s who doesn’t ensure complete immunity. They thrive on  network as all such godmen thrive in the early days, because they need a network to spread their divinity and testify their awesome  powers to the gullible- be it curing the ill, or telling past events in the life of persons correctly.  You need someone who would be brought to the stage on wheel chair and  after a few minutes of prayer start walking to show your credibility.

Most of such men (and women) have a dubious past- small time cheats to  outright criminals.  Yet they manage to convince you to believing their New Avtaar as something truly divine. I read that Thanku Brother- the televangelist who used to perform faith healing on a mass scale with hysterical followers was involved in some dubious deals and went missing for some time before resurfacing as Brother Thanku. Santosh Madhavan- the ever smiling (cinema villain style) guru had cheated many even abroad and there was an Interpol notice against him. Still he ran his sex and spiritualism racket quite effectively and had a large following including some top brass of Kerala Police. Himaval Bhadrananda held a police station to ransom at  gun point (pointing to his own head) and finally shot a photographer before being overpowered. He looks like a drug addict.  Divya Joshi – a godwoman fooled many with magical cure and grabbed their property. These men and women also kept a gang of goons who would terrorize and even eliminate those who dare to oppose. I have mentioned only a few  of the lot. 

A faith healing centre was recently in the centre of the storm for the death of hundreds of old and sick who went there hoping for a magical cure. The case was even referred to Supreme court but  the state govt. (which was accused of being anti god) decided to drop the charges for the fear of minority vote. This and other faith healing centres (on the way from Kochin airport to Trichur) still attracts a lot of believers. Indian Railways had even set up a railway  station ( I think by the name Divine Nagar)  by the side of one such centre where some important trains stop.

Chattan seva ( worship of Poltergeist) is another thriving business in Kerala. There was a famous place in central Kerala. After the death of the family chief, the kids parted ways and now the location has 4 to 5 poltergeist temples – each claiming they being the true heirs of the legacy. They attract  people offering solutions to their financial problems, trouble from enemies and poltergeist attacks (Chathaneru).

We have a tendency to equate Islam with fundamentalism and extremism. But it is true that you hardly find any Islamic godman- probably the reason being,  as per their tenets, Allah is the only god and Mohammad is the last prophet. So for the fear of a Fatwa, nobody can claim divine powers. 

What is the reason for flocking behind these men and women most of whom are plain charlatans?  Even though we Indians claim to be the undisputed kings of spiritualism , in the core of our heart, our lust of material wealth and position makes the west shy for cover. We want prosperity and wellbeing through any which way that is easy. We want short cuts to everything. We want mental peace that is delivered to us in a platter. We believe that someone knows us better than we does because we don’t want to understand self. We believe that people do have such supernatural powers as to predict future and that will alleviate our future problems not knowing that the only person who is benefited out of it is the pretender of supernatural powers- the godman. We hear stories of their cheatings but still believe that the new godman on the block is genuine and rush to them. The worst part is that often the followers don’t even stand a criticism of their godman. They take it as an attack on their own ego and vehemently defend their and their mentor’s  actions ( here I deliberately omitted the term Guru).

Oft repeated  Eulogy of many of such people is that they do a lot of charity, they run schools, hospitals, and housing project for the poor. This is true. But they do it with such a fanfare that it will put Rotarians and Lions to shame. There is no auditing of the fund flow. The amount of money generated by these men is simply mostly unaccounted. It is but natural to hide this immense accumulation of wealth under the guise of some charity. Bill Gates also does a lot of charity so is Tatas and a lot of other business houses. They don’t claim divinity. They donate a share of their profit to charity. So you don’t have to be a godman to do charity. It is often said that what one  hand gives , the other hand should not know- that is true charity. But these people do it with such fanfare that you start doubting their motive. I know many of my friends who without any fanfare, help the poor, donate to such institutions like CRY, Helpage etc. Some even don’t claim tax exemptions for these donations. They keep it strictly private. Their act seems to me to be much more  noble.

Kerala tourism’s  catchphrase is “God’s Own Country”. But looking at the events unfolding in the state, it will be more apt to call it “Godmen’s Own Country”.

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