I have always come across people who form their opinions in microseconds based on few ignorant reports published in the media. They tend to trust media more than the God himself. Recently I came across a report published in India’s foremost weekly ‘India Today’ about the charges against Puttaparthi Sai Baba. It interviewed few closest disciples of Sai Baba, and reported about the child abuse carried out by him and also about how he seem to have cheated people with his siddhis or magic (termed by few) of taking Shiva Linga from his mouth, or bringing a gold chain or the holy vibhuti (holy ash) from thin air!
These acts of siddhis of course look illogical for human minds, for our minds are trained in a particular fashion by the society so that we refuse to think beyond that. It is just like how the people of ‘Gods Must Be Crazy’ were unable to interpret what a Coke bottle is….which doesn’t mean Coke doesn’t exist.
I am blessed with a brother in law who does all the frauds to make money, and who loves to pull me in an argument about esoteric science. He keeps abusing astrologers, gemmolists, tantriks and Godmen, and I try to keep my mouth shut because there is no point teaching a 2nd std student about Derivation and Integration.
Once we had an argument about Satya Sai Baba, and he kept telling how BIG a fraud he is. I asked him on what basis are your forming your opinion? He said he knows (may be God himself whispered in his ears). Not that I had total trust on Sai Baba that time, I was just against forming opinions without trying to know what exactly he (Sai) was into.
We had a bet. I said, I accept he is a fraud. And you do the same thing now. Grow your beard, call yourself a sanyasi, and do all that magic he does and tell me how many disciples you will get in 1 year. I said, I will stop practicing astrology if you manage to get at least 10 disciples. And he shut his mouth. That was the last day he spoke about Satya Sai Baba with me.
I just wanted to convey him that you cannot fool everyone all the time, and Sai Baba is there for the last 15-20 years now and there is no way the number of people visiting him has reduced. People are not fools but of course are selfish. They won’t revere things or waste their time on people or things that doesn’t make a change in their personal lives. And also if you think he is a fraud then probably you should salute him for he is a BETTER fraud than YOU.
As far as I am concerned my admiration for Sai Baba increased when I saw a MIRACLE (not a coincidence in scientific language) in my life. Will discuss that in my next blog about Miracles in My Life someday later.
So what do you think Sai Baba is? A God or a Fraud?