Robert Priddy (3) Friendship With V.K. Narasimhan

Robert Priddy says that he found some devastating facts from one of Sai Baba’s very closest confidants in the 1980s and 1990s.

This was V.K. Narasimhan (d. March 2000). This remarkable man, whose history of standing courageously up (many fine citizens were flung into jail!) as a newspaper Editor to Indira Gandhi during the 21-month 1975–1977 Emergency was known and is still remembered with admiration throughout India, and well beyond.

Friendship With VKN Was Worth Cherishing

Narasimhan, Editor of the Sai Baba official magazine, Sanathana Sarathi, that is distributed worldwide, was a warm mutual friend of the both of us, although Priddy’s and my paths did not cross. VKN, as he was with much affection known, was earlier ex-Editor-in-Chief of the Indian Express group of newspapers, and widely regarded as very upright, and one of the few who were not fauning lickspittles around Sai Baba. He was, although an outstanding public speaker, in many ways a very private man. He would not in any other circumstance than admiration and trust have shared years of trusted friendship with Robert Priddy.

A Top Indian Official Tells BBC Television: “Absolute Cold Blooded Murder”

Robert Priddy relates how, on the direct initiative of Sai Baba’s younger brother and multi millionaire property developer, Janaki Ramiah (now deceased) and other officials of the ashram and Central Trust, the police were blackmailed into executing in cold blood in Sai Baba’s own rooms, four intruders who had killed two of his attendants. No less than a former Andhra Pradesh former Home Secretary, V.P.B. Nair, has described the killings in the BBC’s television documentary The Secret Swami as “absolute cold blooded murder”. View and hear Nair speaking to interviewer Tanya Datta, in this film clip HERE.

These intruders could easily have been captured without murdering them. Sai Baba was nearby as events unfolded, hour by hour, and yet – a virtual ‘omnipotent’ dictator within his independent ashram township, at least – did not lift a finger to stop the deaths. These he said afterwards in a discourse he knew beforehand would happen!

Chilling Whisperings Under Less Than Spiritual Temple Pillars

Priddy recounts how VKN shared this information with him with a lowered voice. Robert has remarked to me in various connections over time that his own subsequent extensive investigations have confirmed Narasimhan’s account. He says that VKN informed him of a discussion to which he was witness between Janaki Ramiah (Sai Baba’s younger brother) and the particularly powerful then Home Minister of India (S.B. Chavan, a Sai Baba devotee) who congratulated the brother on his actions in dealing with the matter, whereupon they laughed together over the words ‘Dead men tell no tales.’ The account is spine-chilling.

Priddy, who kept a detailed journal during these years, has given a long account of his very close friendship through a decade with V.K. Narasimhan and what they shared in hundreds of hours of private conversation, HERE

Further Reading

Wikipedia entry under: Robert Priddy

My Credo

His Blogsite

His Website

On the V.P.B. Nair BBC interview, See my article:
Indian Ex Top Official Dogs Sai Baba On BBC. ‘Cold-blooded Murder’

And more on the BBC 2 This World Documentary:
The BBC’s ‘The Secret Swami’ – A Revision 
Probed On Male Sex Abuse, Sai Baba Evicts BBC TV Team
India A Mature Democracy? BBC Probes