Godmen: A Safe Passage to Wealth
Every often we come across God-men/God-women conning people around and getting into serious trouble. In India, it possibly is the easiest way to make wealth. The wealth which is not accounted for and no one has to be answerable. There are plenty of such people around us in this modern world. Shri Shri Ravi Shankar (Not content with one Shri), Baba Ramdev, Mata Amrutha (Amma), Baba so and so and etc. If one takes a look at the past of the above people, one would know that they all had very humble beginning. Mostly they were from very poor families. Look at them now? They are all rolling into riches and can afford anything and everything in this world. Bhagwan Rajneesh had the best collection of Benz Cars in the world. He possibly had more wealth than many Americans. Another Baba had his own chartered plane which later became his cause for death. Today, we get news of Lokayuktha Raids on various Government Staff for holding wealth disproportionate to his known source of income. What about these God-men etc. Who is keeping a tab on their source of income and where does all this go. Another interesting factor which goes with the above are the strong Coterie which grows around these people. One such strong example is that of Mata Amrutha, who is popularly called Amma. She is from a poor fishermen community and would like to do plenty to uplift them but cannot even move her fingers to do anything for them since she is surrounded by people who have formed such strong coterie that she is literally dictated terms of what to do and what not to do. One just cannot penetrate this ring even if one knows Amma personally. There is but one more example of how this coterie functions and makes money. One of her strong believer had aspired to get admission for his son in the Engineering College run by the organisation. This is supposed to be a charity organisation. His son had scored good marks and could have got into any good Engineering College. They were in for a shock when the people who mattered asked for five lakh donation. I wonder if Mata, the Hugging Saint, knows about this or has been informed. Even if she is informed, she can do nothing because of the strong coterie and nexus. Similar is the story of all other people of this category. Shri Shri Ravi Shankar uses a bullet proof car to commute. Why? What is he scared of and why? He is busy piling up his wealth and teaching people how to live. Do we really want this to be taught to us? Again, it is the fear of God that pushes people to go and fall at his feet and pour out ill-gotten wealth. It’s a fad for foreigners to fall for such classes which takes them to the oriental world. For them it is experimenting and an experience different from their culture. What about us Indians. Are we still that naive? If one carries out a realistic study of each of these so called Godly people, there will be plenty of skeletons which will fall off from their cupboards. One among the lot was Late Sathya Sai Baba. In his younger days he had got into lots of trouble and controversy. In his later years he had made amends to it and done plenty for the people of the arid land that he came from. People are proud of such holy men who do service to the poor. If Temples can be got under the Devaswom Board, why not these people who amass unaccounted wealth. The Government need to have a serious thought on how they can check this huge amount of money which is merely hoarded and goes to the wrong hands. But, before all this could happen, we need to educate each one of our near and dear ones what this menace is all about. Start loving God and then you will never ever have to depend on others to show you the path of truth. It is the fear of God that pulls people to go to such people and ashrams. Do good in life and only then you will start loving God.
