How Sai Baba devotees behave and why

Foremost in the sphere of excessive claimants to spiritual wisdom and power is Sathya Sai Baba of Puttaparthi (born Sathya Narayana Raju). Having managed to convince ignorant villagers and impressionable townsfolk in Indian most backward region that he has divine powers (something they already believed of many swamis and gurus before him) he gradually set himself up as God Incarnate and avatar, annexing the name and fame of a former very popular saint, Shirdi Sai Baba.

That he is controversial is incontestable. That he has instigated what, for one person, represents a considerable amount of social projects for a large number of people is certain. That he claims to be wholly pure and divine, ever-present everywhere, all-knowing, almighty is a fact, but one against which there is both much reliable negative evidence.

Like countless others through the ages, Sathya Sai Baba – born as Sathya Narayana Raju – has employed the widespread belief in God and divinities – and longing for blessings, spiritual benefits and salvation from all human problems to dupe and dominate everyone who enters his domain. The weakness of people who cannot face life fully but must lean on a mere belief that their have a ‘Father’ of ‘Mother’ somewhere still looking after them ( though invisible and ineffective in helping them) is turned to great advantage by Sathya Sai Baba in the subtlest of ways. Hence, followers have to become as virtual slaves to his agenda to believe that nothing can be done without his “Divine Will”, operating in the ever-unseen, ever-uncontrollable limbo of his inscrutable and unaccountable  person! They are strictly to avoid reading anything negative about him, on pain of banishment from his grace and the ashrams where many have invested heavily in small, simple but expensive apartments (to which, however, they have no right of ownership). He has the tightest protection of a large number of security personnel and that of the past several Indian governments, which provide the visible armed guards at his ashrams.

Sathya Sai Baba has for decades denied interviews to anyone who doesn’t have enough faith in him. Since the infamous murders of young men in his bedroom in 1993 (while he stood by) every visitor has to pass through intensive security checks and metal detectors – with armed guards standing by – to get anywhere near him. They kow-tow, and if they wait endlessly in lines to come and sit for days on end, he may deign to  look at them, which they consider extremely auspicious. The most zealous spend months of waiting all day from the earliest moment it is allowed so as to get to the fore and sit with praying hands until he can hardly ignore them without seeming totally devoid of compassion. If they grovel (as people can be seen doing on countless videos and films issues by the Sai authorities), and/or if they make considerable financial contributions, then then MAY be admitted to the “holy sanctum”, by which time they have humiliated themselves sufficiently to accept almost anything from the hand of God, be it praise or blame!

The Sai Baba movement as a whole has increasingly assumed the features of a closed cult that is protecting a very widely and substantially accused sexual molester and pedophile and an undoubted accomplice to police murders, which he strove to cover up. This collusive complicity is largely possible because of the out-of-hand rejection of any criticism of any kind against their Lord and Master, in accordance with his teaching about himself and outright commands to ignore such. Yet most are now in a position to discover and know many of the facts. That they rationalize away whatever they hear is not least due to their deep involvement (often over decades) at most levels of their lives in following this very personable and socially and psychologically powerful of Indian gurus. Pitiful examples of these blinded acolytes, having resigned themselves to anything and given up the will and ability to distinguish fact and fantasy, are found in the leaders of the international Sathya Sai Organisation.