Indian Spiritual Gurus!!! Holds the most prominent position in our country today. Right from local politicians to the Prime Minister of India, everybody worships them. The businessman lines up to meet them and keeps making them wealthier with their generous donations. India is a country where people believe in spirituality. I am not saying that spirituality doesn’t exist at all, but, in this modern world, the word spiritual has become a source attaining name and fame. The stories of the Indian Spiritual Babas that we about to tell you is sufficient enough to understand everything…
You may think that only in India people believe in spiritual Babas, but, that is not true. Spiritual Babas have been ruling the world, and most of them are originated from India. If you remember about Bhagwan Rajneesh, whose popularity had reached up to the USA, it will be very easy to guess, how powerful they are in a country, where people worship them like a God.
As they say, with more power, more responsibly comes, but, these Babas seems to have forgotten this basic principle of the universe, and hence they began making misuse of the trust bestowed on them by people. The arrest of Asaram Babu had resulted into opening the pandora’s box. It exposed the dark sides of Babas once considered as Indias Spiritual Gurus in India.
There are no two ways about millions of Indians have unshakable faith in the teachings of various spiritual gurus, babas, and self-proclaimed godmen. In fact, it was the case of Asaram Bapu, who found guilty of raping a 16-year-old girl in his Ashram, shattered the faith of devotees on the babas. Following Asaram Babu, there were several other babas names had been surfaced in different controversies, but one thing that was common amongst all, and that is the amount of wealth these babas have accumulated in their name during their tenure.
While most of the Babas were seen donned in while or saffron clothes, displaying their humble appearances but, beneath the modest looks, hidden the assets worth crores of rupees which they had accumulated while sitting in the position of spiritual gurus. Their assets did not remain limited to India but it was spread across the world.
We are not questioning the credibility of all the Indian Spiritual Gurus but, one thing we know that one who donned in white clad, supposed to stay away from worldly pleasure, and most of you have already seen the luxurious life these babas live in. Let us take a look at some of the most controversial Spiritual Gurus of India and assess their wealth accumulation, and in this episode, we are going to talk about the most controversial spiritual guru of India, Asaram Bapu.
Asaram Bapu, born in the year 1941, in Gujarat, had left his home at the age of 23 in a search of God, and in the year 1970 he managed to gather enough number of followers who helped him built his first Ashram in Gujarat, and by the end of 2013, Asaram Bapu became the guru of 400 Ashrams across the country with millions of followers in India and abroad. How that became possible we are going to see in the next few paras.
The major source of assets was accumulation through the acquisition of land across the country in the names of Ashram. Ashrams became the business hub for generating revenue in various forms. The major flow of income came from political parties who invariably made use of the Ashrams dwellers for their vote banks. In 1973, Asaram had around 10 followers and a small hutment, which was later converted by him into the Ashram with the help of various political parties came into the power time after time.
In the year 1982, INC (Indian National Congress) allotted Asaram Bapu 14,500 sq.mt. land to set up the Ashram and from here onwards Asaram Bapu did not stop, and his assets started growing. Later on in the year 1999 BJP-Led government allotted him 25,000 Sq.Mt. land for the expansion of his Ashram. Asaram Bapu, who had only 10 followers in 1973, grew up to thousands and lakhs of followers by 2013 with the help of politicians, who became his devotees. By 2013, Asharam Bapu had 400 major and minor ashrams in India and abroad, with numerous followers.
The downfall of Asaram began in the year 2008 with news of, the death of, two of his disciples in the Ashram, which led to public protests. There were rumors about black magic being practiced in the Ashram, which was later found false. But soon in the year 2013, Asaram Bapu was arrested when a 16-year-old girl had accused him of sexually assaulting her in Jodhpur.
Following the arrest of Asaram Bapu, more of his bad deeds stated getting surfaced into the media, and here people came to know about a number of assets he had accumulated during his tenure, which was in the room of Rs. 10,000 crores. How Asaram accumulated such a huge amount of assets was the first question that flashed into everyone’s mind. It was not done overnight but, in the span of 40 years that Asaram had managed to accumulate such a huge amount of assets with the help of greedy politicians who helped him to help themselves.
In the next edition we are going to bring to you the story of another Spiritual Guru, meanwhile you please let us know as for how you liked this story, do you have any suggestions, or we have missed something. Your suggestions will help us improve the future stories of the Indian Spiritual Gurus.
Coming up next Nirmal Baba, Stay tuned…..
IMAGE SOURCE: MID DAY | INDIA TODAY
