CNN-IBN Reports Action On Corrupt Indian Gurus
Posted by Barry Pittard on August 2, 2008
The influential media outlet CNN-IBN has just come out with a series of articles on the increasing exposure of ‘godmen’ in India.
What will not be so obvious is the courage of those in journalism, the judiciary, police forces and so on who are putting themselves in danger when they attempt to confront the forces of corruption.
The links to the CNN-IBN reports are immediately below, and beneath these are links (with quotes) to a number of articles in Call for Media and Government Investigation of Sathya Sai Baba. These span many months, and hold out the hope that the forces of anti-corruption and of those who uphold the justifiable Indian pride in her great and varied culture will be able to triumph.
Even as I write there are reports that India has the best human rights record in Asia. This will not have been achieved without the cost of tremendous courage and sacrifice – much of it never recordable.
With India on her way to becoming a superpower, a great contribution she can make – one that can indeed shame those countries which flaunt their democratic traditions – is to clean up her ‘house’ and set an example of flourishing democratic achievements. For decades, the profoundly failed guru, Sathya Sai Baba, has been saying that he will first clean up his ‘own backyard’. He has made all too little dent but India does not need him. She has, down millennia, furnished the worthy aims that he uncontroversially preaches. She has long abounded in great exemplars. It is goods delivery well in excess of all the preaching by her sometimes shady and failed gurus that is needed.
In her rich and marvelous multiculture, these qualities can be asserted by any irrespective of culture, class or creed .
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CNN-IBN Reports just released
Self-styled godmen under increasing scrutiny
Fri, Aug 01, 2008 at 21:34, Updated at Fri, Aug 01, 2008 in Nation India section
Framed or foul play? Asaram followers left wondering
Fri, Aug 01, 2008 at 21:16, Updated at Fri, Aug 01, 2008 in Nation sectio. Tags: Asaram Bapu, Ashram , New Delhi
Journalists protest against media attack in Gujarat.
CNN-IBN, Sat, Jul 19, 2008 at 18:53 in Nation section
Spiritual guru’s followers brutally attack journos
Fri, Jul 18, 2008 at 23:17 in Nation section
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Further related articles at Call for Media and Government Investigation of Sathya Sai Baba at: https://barrypittard.wordpress.com
These articles tyically refer to the poor, but apparently slowly improving, India media showing with regard to running news inimical to the most powerful Indian gurus, of whom Sathya Sai Baba has long been the most powerful of all, worshipped by millions as God.
Supercool Indian Gurus Under Fire
The following readings indicate two-way pulls occurring in India – towards gurus and the extraordinary power many of them have, down millennia, wielded, and away from them
V.P.B. Nair. B.Premanand. R.Priddy: Sai Baba Bedroom Killings
Many Indian journalists and editors and others know of the profound extent of the cover up by the then powerful Home Minister S.B. Chavan, and central, Andhra Pradesh State and local governments. It is a pity that very few have had the courage to speak out publicly on the issue, as has former Andhra Pradesh Home Secretary V.P.B. Nair, who was in office at the time of the killings. It is a sad commentary that very few had the courage in speaking out displayed by those such as Nair and B. Premanand. See the BBC Film Clip of V.P.B. Nair making his statement
The Guru Trap. Will India Be Forever Trapped?
Tehelka is regarded by many observers as one of few newspapers in India which can show some investigate clout and courage. It has sustained tremendous pressure by Indian governments and other power brokerage forces in India. Below is an excerpt from Tehelka, which points the need for India to come clean and act decisively about her frequent cultivation and protection of nefarious gurus. Sathya Sai Baba gets a reference.
‘Moon Mission of Sathya Sai Baba’. Re Merinews Article
Noting that the Indian news service Merinews.com contained an article by Natteri Adigal which gave me a brief mention, I responded.
This was, Moon mission of Sathya Sai Baba: Only for the faithful! by Natteri Adigal, Thursday, 29 November 2007
Is Sai Baba’s Governmental Influence ‘Miraculous’?
Yesterday’s blog, HERE, noted the Indian magazine Business Standard news current report that the Sathya Sai Central Trust is putting Sai Baba’s Puttaparthi airport up for sale. It was revealing to find an old 1998 Indian Express report that saw corrupt links between Sai Baba’s chief representatives and a then Civil Aviation boss. Most Indian publications have long suffered their publisher’s censorship against reports adverse to Sathya Sai Baba. As the Editor of one of India’s leading newspapers told me: Sai Baba is too powerful, with so many devotees all over India. Likely to have been all too little noticed, then, was a report filed in the Indian Express in February 1998 by reporter Swati Chaturvedi. It points to corrupt origins in the sanctioning of the Sathya Sai airport. What the Swati Chaturvedi article does not mention is that the then Civil Aviation Secretary, M.K. Kaw, is a Sathya Sai Baba devotee.
Sai Baba’s Airport Up For Sale, Reports Business Standard
Sai Baba`s airport up for sale
S Kalyana Ramanathan / Chennai October 31, 2007
“Trust puts floor price at Rs 600 crore
The airport’s owner, the Sri Sathya Sai Central Trust, which manages the religious and philanthropic assets and work of Sri Sathya Sai Baba, has invited bids for it and put the floor price at Rs 600 crore”
Indian Nuclear Scientist Now Sai Baba’s Global Radio Chief
These days Sai Baba’s chief international propagandist (via Sai Global Harmony and WorldSpace International Satellite Radio Service) and deputy head of the immensely wealthy and influential world Sathya Sai Organization, Dr G. Venkataraman, was a top Indian nuclear scientist
Top Vajpayee Minister Thinks BBC Was Plotting
For a glimpse at the clearly morally bankrupt showing of the Vajpayee government on many allegations facing Sathya Sai Baba, see the video clip from the BBC’s The Secret Swami (2004), HERE
Is Indian ‘Godman’ Sai Baba’s Moon Waning Still Further?
The report below, I have excerpted from the DNAINDIA news service. It indicates that Sathya Sai Baba’s chief translator and personal India and international emissary, Professor Anil Kumar, has acknowledged the extraordinary traffic and crowd snarls occasioned by Sai Baba’s trip to his private airport at Puttaparthi.
It is reported that India’s most famous and controversial guru was at the airport in his car on the evening of Thursday October 4, 2007, which got badly detained by unruly crowds. He would be present, it was believed, to preside over a profound mass vision that he, as God, would perform. An Indo Asian News Service (IANS) staff writer reported …
P.N. Bhagwati, India’s Ex-Chief Justice: Wild, Reckless Claims
P.N. Bhagawati, former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of India, a key figure on the Sathya Sai Central Trust (India) has also long been on the Board of Directors of The Times of India
Indian Gurus Stifle India’s Chance To Excel
“Watershed year for Indian law” reports BBC’s Sanjoy Majumder
“For many, 2006 has been a watershed in Indian legal history”, states Sanjoy Majumder, Friday, 5 January 2007, BBC News, Delhi:
For the first time, a serving cabinet minister (Shibu Soren), was given life imprisonment for murder. Under a fortnight later, a cricket star and MP (Navjot Singh Sidhu) was jailed for manslaughter. Majumder reports “A recent study suggests that nearly a quarter of the country’s MPs are facing criminal charges ranging from murder to extortion and even rape”, and that “India’s courts are estimated to have a backlog of some two million cases”. See useful BBC News links about corruption in India here.
Gurubusting Sathya Sai Baba
Breaking decades of virtual Indian media silence on comment critical of Sathya Sai Baba, a number of major Indian news organizations have run (mostly November 22, 2006) the Indo-Asian News Service (IANS) report on Paul Lewis’s article in The Guardian, ‘The Indian living god, the paedophilia claims and the Duke of Edinburgh awards’“…
Sai Baba’s “Back Yard” Still A Mess
India A Mature Democracy? BBC Probes
Would many Indian politicians, notorious for their extreme corruption, dare expose the foreign goose that lays the (cosmic!) golden egg? Driving this question would have reinforced the producer Eamon Hardy’s original query about whether India is a mature democracy.
View The Secret Swami HERE. Available in broadband and modem. Read:
The BBC’s The Secret Swami – A Revision.
The Genesis of the BBC’s The Secret Swami (Sai Baba)
Who In India Will Stand out Against Abuses?
According to reports by Sanjoy Majumdar, BBC New Delhi and Tim Sullivan of Associated Press, there have been some recent populist stirrings in India against corruption and its cover-up. Not that there have not long been those Indians who have stood up valiantly against these. One may hope that the groundswell will come to include corrupt gurus
Will India’s New Backlash Against Corruption Lash Sathya Sai Baba?
“Watershed year for Indian law” reports BBC’s Sanjoy Majumder
“For many, 2006 has been a watershed in Indian legal history”, states Sanjoy Majumder, Friday, 5 January 2007, BBC News, Delhi:
For the first time, a serving cabinet minister (Shibu Soren), was given life imprisonment for murder. Under a fortnight later, a cricket star and MP (Navjot Singh Sidhu) was jailed for manslaughter. Majumder reports “A recent study suggests that nearly a quarter of the country’s MPs are facing criminal charges ranging from murder to extortion and even rape”, and that “India’s courts are estimated to have a backlog of some two million cases”. See useful BBC News links about corruption in India here.
Call For Media and Government Investigation 
Chanchal Dutta said
The most important factor in any planning for India’s development & economic uplift is that of turning hungry, discontented people in a happy well-fed one. But our Goverment was doing the just the opposite. Since independence all Prime Ministers were known as tainted because their party members are involved with bribary,corruption,murder,extortion,stealing,ebezzlement.Corrupt political system overlooks the appointment of first woman IPS officer for the post of Delhi Commissioner. Sonia Gandhi’s choice is Y.S Dadwal.After Independence, rich have trashed huge wealth and become so rich that with their superfluous wealth find way into buying European & American companies at a premium price.
The business community of Indian/Pakistanis are so corrupt that they destroyed the general life style and financial development of Kenya. Indian/Pakistani business community siphoning the treasury using fictitious promissory contracts for services not delivered in all sectors of the economy.Similarly they do the same thing in India under the Congress Government. Also BJP cannot deny their involvement. Middleclass families in India are faced with digging even deeper into their wallets to cover the lost packets. People need to voting out these corrupt systems. Millions of educated children remain unemployed and they are the worst sufferers.
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