This week a court was again hearing a petition filed by Yogesh Thakkar in India, complaining, in his opinion, of embezzlement of funds by Osho Estate Trustees, and violations under FEMA (Foreign Exchange Management Act), by allegedly using, he says, a forged will of Osho.
According to Thakkar, a document stated to be Osho’s last will and testament surfaced in legal proceedings in Spain, 23 years after his death. A photocopy of that document was subjected to forensic examination and was found, according to him, to be forged, though others dispute this.
On Tuesday, the bench appreciated CBI’s stand saying the matter was required to be investigated by the agency, as “there are international ramifications”. It has, however, decided to wait for the outcome of the letter rogatory sent by the local police to the Spanish court seeking copy of the purportedly forged will.
The decision came after the judges perused a status report in sealed cover submitted by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which is also conducting parallel investigation into the alleged embezzlement of Osho trust funds.
On August 12, another bench had ordered that the RBI and ED be made respondents in the petition. The petitioner has accused Osho International Foundation (OIF), Switzerland, and trustees Mukesh Sarda, Michael Byrne, John Andrews, D’Arcy Byrne and Klaus Steeg of allegedly defrauding the Indian Osho trusts of crores of rupees.
The petitioner has also demanded that a police complaint pending before the economic offences wing (EOW), Mumbai, dated February 9, be registered as an FIR and that the Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999 be invoked to look into this “multi-million dollar fraud”.
Thakkar does seem obsessed by this matter, and presumably has considerable monies of his own to pursue the matter. Some of his claims seem journalistic to say the least.
To make a judicial distinction between truth, fiction, crime and heresay, Indian investigative agency CBI has a track record as good as crime and fraud investigative agencies in the western countries.
Being seekers of truth, Osho disciples all around the world should welcome this ultra-sound screening. Something in the system is surely not wholesome and healthy.
You say, Shantam Prem:
“Something in the system is surely not wholesome and healthy.”
Where you are right, you are right, Shantam Prem!
The essential question though might be: How to develop some mental, psychological and spiritual resilience instead of spreading the ´virus´ in abundance…
That (the latter), according to my understanding, is mostly happening here at SN/UK and often with you as a ´spokesman´ for such.
Madhu
During last few days I have heard from few different people that they are happy that they were not with Osho alive or part of any of his communes.
This observation they have got by coming in contact with those Swamis and Mas who have nothing else to offer but the boasting of their being Pune 1 sannyasins or in Rajneeshpuram.
In my opinion, all these people are indirectly responsible for the great fiascos. To read Madhu, I agree with them. It is very difficult to feel compassion instead of contempt for superficially nice people who are ready to throw their shit on those who are not cause of their miserable state of living.
“Those who must face the mirror break the mirror” – this collective attitude is ingrained in many of the people who were glowing under the light of Osho.
When contents of the string get dominated by personal bitching, it is no fun nor intelligent brainstorming. It is also not a joy to be constantly in the tit-for-tat discussion.
In this string, I have expressed my opinion about the supposed investigation by the Indian law enforcement authorities into Osho Trust matters. Was there a need for some faceless woman to pour acid on my face? Why here buttons are pushed? If she thinks, acts and omissions by the present trustees are over the board, why not cheer them up?
One can give counter-opinion, one can discuss minutely the minds behind the games, but why to create smokescreen of tantrums?
My suggestion will be to delete my comment and also Madhu´s because they are not in the spirit of string but personal nonsense.
MOD:
Shantam, WE FEEL Madhu HAS A RIGHT TO MAKE THE POINT SHE DID (WHILE NOT NECESSARILY AGREEING WITH IT).
Shantam, since you have studied law, could you tell what law there is for an Indian person who has power of attorney of a foreign national, Swami Kavish of Germany (who has living family members) of a few million dollars worth of immovable property: after the death of the foreign national what is the rightful status of ownership of that property?
Can such a person who has a power of attorney & not returned the property to the rightful owners, be eligible for such a claim on such FEMA matters?
I have no interest in anyone’s personal legal battle, since this is discussed on SN: at the same time I cannot be silent about this, as existentially I have this information.
In case of deceased person, ownership transfers automatically to the rightful legal owner, in most of the cases legally married partner and the children. This is universally accepted law.
Power of attorney is mostly rendered for the maintenance of the property as many of us expat or exiled sannyasins who have flats in Pune and have given the power of attorney to the care takers for leasing the property and filling the annual taxes.
Last will or testament is totally different situation where the render with sound mind and body in the presence of independent witnesses bestows some part or whole of the property to some charity or to someone else on the basis of love.
Naturally in such situation, family members hire the lawyers to contest whether will is fraudulent or was rendered under some pressure or by intoxicating the person.
About the topic of CBI enquiry, more than the outcome let us discuss what is the position of the bloggers, how the mind and heart takes the sides.
For example, can Parmartha accept the fact, present trustees are following the same Sheela syndrome of criminal manipulations even though they are not women and also not Indian?
In my case, if independent enquiry is conducted by retired judges to sort out the matter through mediation, I will accept the outcome without any problem.
IF CBI conducts criminal investigation and comes on the conclusion that cases against Osho Foundation trust are malafide and trustees are following the spirit and words of their founder, No Problem.
I have no personal attachment with any of the sides though from what I have seen and observed, trustees will be in the deep, hot soup, and if they come under the radar it can be a new chapter in the benefits to us all and others.
I simply want to play one role and that is to create rules and regulations for the power-to-be. Chairman and co-chairman position will be only for two years and other 18 trustees too won´t be in their position for more than 4 years.
The flagship property will have its original name, Osho Commune International. Buddha Hall will be restored again and will be central point, being the historical monument. Price structure will be AT COST basis and disciples will be encouraged to come, come, yet come again, yet it will be made clear not more than 6 months in any calendar year.
“I have no personal attachment with any of the sides though from what I have seen and observed, trustees will be in the deep, hot soup, and if they come under the radar it can be a new chapter in the benefits to us all and others.”?
Well, in this case, no (Osho) seeker would want to take any sides, I guess. & what are the benefits, if they can be specified?
Certainly looks like you are very much in a hurry!
Benefits are, Kavita, that maybe you find again the temptation to visit commune when hundreds of others are coming. Resort must be a dead-end place that someone like you who lives few hundred metres away never go there.
Benefits are that real community is revived. I am 101% sure most of the sannyasins don´t need new gurus but living connection with living Osho Community.
This is one reason majority of those who go to this or that Satsang guru feel even more alienated and broken because they are trying to clean their ears not from ear buds but from tooth picks!
“Benefits are that real community is revived. I am 101% sure most of the sannyasins don´t need new gurus but living connection with living Osho Community.
This is one reason majority of those who go to this or that Satsang guru feel even more alienated and broken because they are trying to clean their ears not from ear buds but from tooth picks!”
Shantam,
I can understand your honourable intention that you want to make the organisation more democratic so that sannyasins get a better feeling about Pune.
But for what? That sannyasins go again there to spend time and money because it is such a juicy place?
Did you ever consider the fact that it is also a blessing for many that Pune is no more attractive? Now they can finally be happy where they are. And is this not exactly the teaching of the Master and his ‘Here and Now’?
And last:
If sannyasins feel alienated, is this not only because of their attachment?
Shantam, for me this article is of absolutely no interest whatsoever. Dead and obsolete in terms of having anything to do with my life today. If the Resort went up in flames this afternoon I would not bat an eyelid, so insignificant would such an event be.
Trademarks, who is in charge, who gets royalties from the sale of Osho books etc. I really don’t give a shit about any of these things and I do not see that it has anything to do with what Osho was about either, especially now that he is dead. After all, Osho was all for life and celebrating the fact. Legal actions about what he left behind is so far away from what the sannyas movement was built on.
If someone grabs the money, let them. That is their problem. We all have to face our demons one day and that day will be soon. If you ask me I would say that getting involved in any of this nonsense is a complete and utter waste of time. Such constructs are surely for the dummies in the class who never really bothered to do their homework.
In your case, Lokesh, you withdrew your emotional investment from Pune dream at the right time in a very dignified way. Me being typical Piscean, I put all the eggs in one basket, all the chips on one number.
I was virgin by heart and virgin by body when I entered Osho Commune so every impression is videographed, whereas majority of sannyasins were already fucked up or have screwed others.
Benefit is that I can raise the finger, I can blow the whistle.
Perfectly correct, Shantambhai!
You so rightly say, you can raise the finger, blow the whistle, bash the candle, buff the banana, bop the baloney, choke the chicken, bleed the weasel, clean the rifle, crank the shank, cuff the carrot, fist the mister, flog the dog, flog the hog, beat the meat substitute, flog the log, jerk the gherkin, polish the family jewels, punch the clown, rough up the suspect, shake the creamer, spank the monkey and stroke the salami!
Like the wisdom of mighty Bhorat, time has proven it again and again!
Do not be put off by these absurd, inferior western baboons who had already shagged themselves senseless before reaching gates of sex-guru ashram!
The fact that head and bass chakra were strapped up tight for 25 years by turban and chuddies certainly gives you superior qualifications to blow own trumpet, polish your lingam, double-click the mouse and display qualities as master debater on Sannyas News whilst following master`s guidelines by having sex with someone you love!
Yahoo!
Hari Om!
Shantam, you can blow your whistle until you are blue in the face, but ultimately you are wasting your precious time.
So, Shantam, in claiming such impeccable credentials you’ve demonstrated that you believe you are somehow innately superior in perception, judgment and even ‘morality’ to most of your fellow-sannyasins, that you know better than them what it’s all about, what should and shouldn’t be.
That, of course, is the common delusional mind-set of politicians. I suggest you turn your attention inside and “raise the finger…blow the whistle” on your self and its breathtakingly misplaced, mendacious, arrogance.
That’s if you really believe your own advice (“when he speaks about politicians it is basically a politician inside of us; then we can look at the whole situation with self-analysis…”).
“I have no personal attachment with any of the sides….”
Sounds like typical political bullshine, Shantam. I wonder just who the hell – apart from yourself – you imagine you’re kidding!
Not surprising, SD, I was very much sure this post of mine will bring you out from your shell. I was waiting for your not so surprising comment.
I am not the one who feels offended with the tag of politician, specially when many of so-called spiritualists are even worse then them. An honest prostitute is much more divine than the cheating wife.
You avoid the main point, that you are lying, even to yourself.
Shantam declares, “I am not the one who feels offended with the tag of politician.”
What Shantam perhaps is not aware of is that Osho generally viewed politicians as being dense and stupid people. Politics is tied in with, for want of a better expression, lower chakra activity. In a nutshell…power trips.
Watch politicians, yes, some may be educated and erudite, but really they look like a pretty dumb lot. Of course, there are always exceptions. In the sannyasin world the only politics that sannyasins have been traditionally interested in is the politics of ecstasy. Therefore a declaration like Shantam’s will for most sannyasins place him in the limelight as a dunderhead.
People interested in power of ecstasy may get blow jobs from the otherworldly ladies the way Muslims believe.
I care not about the clever cut pieces of Osho but the complete Osho and zero percent I care about the interpretations of Osho given by anyone. In my brain, very political minds resort to such ugly things by quoting Osho or any other book.
When we remember this insight of Osho that when he speaks about politicians it is basically a politician inside of us; then we can look at the whole situation with self-analysis rather than grapes are sour!
Shantam, when reading such comments of yours, I can’t help thinking that there is something involved in taking sannyas that you have completely missed. You are very focused on worldly affairs and do not seem to get it that if you worked on yourself the world would look completely different. You are not alone in this, because that is what most people do.
It often surprises me that the idea that working on one’s self has not caught on in the general populace. To me, it seems obvious that the key to a healthy and wholesome life lies in the realm of working on your being, because that is the only real change worth focusing on.
External revolutions come and go, yet the world rolls on pretty much unchanged, in the sense that there are always problems if one sees it as such. We project our version of the world onto the screen of life.
You somehow became involved with a guru, at least to external appearances. Gurus as a rule are patient. The external guru is a projection of the real guru who is actually who you are but live in denial of the fact.
The inner guru is also patient…up to a point. One day your inner teacher will tire of your ignorance and employ his age-old tools of sickness, old age and ultimately death to try and awaken you to your real spiritual essence. When that day comes you will see that all your efforts to change things on the outside were a waste of time, time that would have been better spent acquainting you with your real self, something that can’t be taken away.
That is why it is said that it is better not to start on a spiritual enquiry if you do not intend to continue and complete it. By taking sannyas you took a step that is difficult to undo. Yet, instead of working on your self, as Osho advised, you are instead caught up in things that really have nothing to do with you, to the point that you completely identify with those things.
This is not my business. You are posting comments on a sannyasin website and therefore you lay your self open to comments such as this. As Jesus used to say, “Sinner, Repent”. This means you have missed the mark and need to change the way you think and feel or else you will continue to miss the mark. The mark in this case meaning a higher level of being.
Here an element of trust is needed because although the higher can see the lower, the lower cannot by its very nature see the higher. That is why spiritual teachers exist, to give us the idea and inspiration that there is something beautiful that is your birthright, that is beyond all the noise of the external world, something that death cannot destroy, something eternal.
Of course, the mind, often a wild and untamed beast that wishes to consolidate its power, thrashes around and throws up a smokescreen that says, “I am reality, you are me” etc. And hence the mind will say, “This is all nonsense that fool Lokesh is writing, do not pay any attention to what he says.”
Why? Because to follow what the masters indicate will mean the death of the mind’s power over your life. Aye, how true it is to say that the mind is a great servant but a terrible master.
“Mind is a great servant but terrible master.”
Googly of the life when those who think they have tamed the mind becomes victim of the mind.
I know, Lokesh, you are very much impressed by the traditional Indian spiritual nuggets as written by Nisargadatta Maharaj. Your thoughts are very much influenced by that.
I am very much influenced by Osho´s work where everything is part of the whole. We are politicians, we are priests. We are everything and my understanding is if water evaporates and becomes free from the earthly pull, steam can again become water.
Just imagine, Nisargadatta is born again in Mumbai and is trading at stock market and driving Lamborghini.
So my mysticism is not be in a fucking superior space, ‘I am awake and others are sleeping’ kind.
Well, Shantam, you can’t say I did not try. Time will tell. Leaves me wondering why you were attracted to Osho in the first place.
You say, “Just imagine, Nisargadatta is born again in Mumbai and is trading at stock market and driving Lamborghini.”
Easy to imagine, but so what? Imagination is something else that has you under its power. On SN you share your imaginary thoughts. Most here can see that they are just that…a product of imagination that have no grounding in reality. It makes you look like a fool.
Unfortunately, you appear to be unaware of this and keep stumbling along, self-righteous about all manner of unimportant things as far as anyone else is concerned. I rest my case. I have better things to do with my time.
For me, Lokesh, there is only one revolution: to stay with what reality is in the moment we are experiencing.
Always choosing the inner scenario for our battles, for the things we want to change, does not mean being more spiritual than those who want to change the outer world.
If by practising meditation somehow we can influence the reality of our inner world, perhaps the opposite is also true, and therefore the conditions of the outer world influence our inner flight (from head to heart), for example choosing to meditate in a place that inspires deep peace, joy, silence and celebration.
If you were in the middle of a battle between Catalans and Castillians I think you would not be so self-righteous to stay with your eyes closed in Padmasana sitting in the middle of the field. But you would use a criterion to choose one of the two factions or leave your property in Ibiza and not fight (a virile escape).
Whatever you choose would be respectable, apart from being before slapped on both sides and then, when the war is over, ending up doing the waiter in YOUR real estate.
Ciao,
VF
MOD:
ending up doing the waiter in YOUR real estate.
VF, WHAT DOES THIS MEAN, PLEASE?
Veet, I do not think very much about such speculations. I have confidence in my intelligence to the extent that I will be able to deal with what life brings and embrace what situations arise. Life can be cruel and I have faced that in my life. No need to worry about what is not happening.
That is the point of a lot of what I am saying to Shantam. To me, he seems concerned with scenarios that are actually only taking place in his imagination. It has nothing to do with being spiritual or not, but rather observing what is going on in your life and being honest about it.
MOD, Veet means being placed in a servile position in what was once your own home. Which, I might add, is quite a projection into a hypothetical future for someone promoting living in the moment.
That Shantam is missing the point by imagining a non-existent scenario is a bet that I could not do, not knowing him personally.
But knowing Shantam would not make me bet on a specific scenario about Pune anyway, not knowing Jayesh personally.
@Mod
Lokesh’s property in Ibiza=real estate in Pune:
If he feels at home in Ibiza in the same way it was in Pune.
If we don’t fight to affirm what we think is right, and if this will end up benefiting arrogant people, then we must not complain if we lose our rights, including respect from our enemies.
This discussion here between Swami Shantam and other friends is not going to be fruitful anyway. The matter is in the courts and the courts will decide. Most of the sannyasins around the world seem to have little interest in whatever is going on.
Osho kept telling stories of the old dying man who gave a bundle of sticks to his children!
Seems all the senior, most direct sannyasins of Osho, who were present during those discourses have their own wisdom!
Anyway, certainly, whatever will be will be!
“Most of the sannyasins around the world seem to have little interest in whatever is going on.”
Right, because they are not interested in churchly matters.
Yes, Keerti you are perfectly correct in what you say.
Perfectly correct, Shantambhai!
Successful Osho politician will be guaranteed blowjobs from otherworldly gora ladies in after-life of regime-change ashram!
Yahoo!
How many bloggers have responded to the string, to the very theme of this article?
Shantam is the focus or the court cases among the varying sections of cult of Sannyas?
Cult of Sannyas is not an ordinary cult, participants have read the best spiritual literature from around the world, they have logged thousands of hours on meditation, they have the notion to be spiritually superior to any other group of people, they all think no need of nations, and yet 24 acres of real estate is not being managed as per the civilised decorums of evolved societies.
My feeling is cult of Sannyas should be judged with the same yardsticks which Osho used for others, and I am sure no one gets the bribed immunity in Cosmos.
Shantam Prem,
If the Resort should lose this court case and fall, enabling you to lead thousands of disenfranchised sannyasins back to the promised land, will you expect as a reward for your perpetual, self-righteous whining to be given free accommodation for the rest of your life at 17 Koregaon Park, or will you be subject to your own manifesto ration and limit yourself to only six months (per calendar year) to proposition western females?
Oh, btw,
If I were you, I would copyright the name iSingh before Apple grabs it.