SAI 'EDUCARE' AS AN EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION UNDER A SHADOW
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The establishment of so-called Sai Educare schools and colleges by Sathya Sai Baba and related agencies in any civilised country should be carefully monitored since they openly or covertly promote the personality cult of Sathya Sai baba as God Incarnate. I accept some of the human value teaching ideals that motivate these activities, yet I have serious reservations about their various serious shortcomings and also as to the way in which they become interpreted in practice in terms of the repressive and out-dated aspects of Sai Baba's religious doctrines.

Because of the persistent allegations of sexual abuses of young men and boys, including many of the students of his colleges (which cannot be tested in the Indian courts due to Sai Baba's influential power over the Indian judiciary and government), the use the name 'Sai' in connection with moral or 'spiritual' education.

I am well aware that many of those involved are people of good intentions and often also with good moral and social values besides. It is the more saddening that they remain so fundamentally misinformed about Sathya Sai Baba and refuse to re-examine either their own beliefs in light of all that has come out about Sai Baba's fraudulence and abuse of faith or even to study the evidence. Many of his defenders, including Sathya Sai Organization office-bearers involved in leading the 'Educare programme, have admitted that Sai Baba does perform unasked for and unwanted molestations of the genitalia of young men, oiling and rubbing them. Such handling of genitalia without prior agreement - even had it been by a medical doctor - is an offence under the law and is morally reprehensible whatever the esoteric explanations offered by some apologists.

Under intense media pressure, this behaviour by Sathya Sai Baba was confirmed - and only after many years of keeping it secret - by leaders of the Sathya Sai Organisation, for example in Denmark - where the Central Coordinator in Europe , Mr. Thorbjørn Meyer, and his associates have supported this form of molestation of young men and minors as a kind of 'spiritual healing'. Meyer wrote to me that it is "the age old Indian oil ceremony". I happen to know from one of his sons that the other son was treated in that way by Sai Baba in secret, having been directed "not to tell his father"!

Using oil or ash to rub onto the lower stomach, the genitals and even on the perineum has absolutely no justification of any kind - it being neither 'religiously’ nor ‘spiritually’ significant’, as some extremist cult supporters claim. No such 'age-old ceremony' can be documented anywhere (not surprisingly), and several experts on Hinduism have denied that any such practice is traditionally recognised or accepted. (Further documentation concerning 'genital oiling' can be viewed here. On the contrary, such actions are known world-wide to be typical ways of 'grooming' or initiating gradual homosexual 'pedophile' seduction. This is also firmly backed up by over 30 published testimonies and a number of affidavits sworn under oath of more serious sexual abuse by Sai Baba held by lawyers until such time as Sai Baba may be brought before a court.

To try to forward education in the name of a person, Sathya Sai Baba is to risk that among the visiting 'teachers' from India and elsewhere who have been under the close influence of Sai Baba as young boys in his colleges and reaping unwanted consequences. Educare in Europe intends to invite 'teachers' from India, there will quite possibly be ex-student victims of Sathya Sai Baba's long reported abuses, some of whom themselves came thereby to practice such abuses.

A peculiar instance of 'human values in action'
Mr Thorbjørn Meyer, the leader of Sai Educare in Europe, wrote to me that Sai Educare, "is a non-profit foundation outside the Sathya Sai Organisation devoted to spirituality and universal human values". However, it still bears the name 'Sai'. Sai devotees such as Mr. Meyer and his associates are the only people who organise the Educare programme. They all reject out of hand all the great weight of evidence by dozens of reliable people and many depositions sworn under oath of worse sexual molestation by Sathya Sai Baba (people who evidently would not want to confide personally in fanatical devotees and morally unprincipled deniers and attackers like Meyer, Pruzan, Piculell etc. of victims· reputations.

On the strength of around $6 million, the Educare foundation was about to start a High School for youth at Arresdøl Castle, near Copenhagen. The project was made impossible by the healthy reaction of the local Danish public, causing the Educare leaders to withdraw from the contract of buying this prestigious castle and to shelve their plans for a college (until they find some other unsuspecting country in Europe). Despite the great showdown in Denmark, they later claimed it was Sai Baba who had decided against it!

In spring 2002, national Danish TV showed the critical exposé film 'Seduced' about Sai Baba, which included very convincing interviews with victims of Sai Baba's various molestations (including oral sex and attempted anal rape). Mr. Meyer refuted the claims of two victims of major sexual abuse by Sai Baba who gave accounts of their experiences. A young man who had been 16 years old at the time described most credibly Sai Baba's attempt at pederasty and his having to give oral sex under extremely powerful duress. A mature Swedish ex-follower also told of being forced into the oral sex relationship by Sai Baba and explained the circumstances of this and his disaffection in a convincingly natural and frank way. When asked about this and other claims, Mr. Meyer repeatedly insisted (like a mantra to ward off evil) that it was all 'undocumented'. As if statements made by courageous victims speaking up in the face of his own previous accusations of homosexuality etc. on film were not of any 'documentary' status. Since Sai Baba counts the Indian High Chief Justice Bhagwati, hundreds of high and circuit court judges plus the right-wing Hindu PM of India, Vajpayee, and many such among his followers, the victims have been unable so far to get the courts to accept their plea or examine the evidence! Mr. Meyer was pressed to agree to investigate the allegations by a TV journalist, which he agreed to do but has not done more than most perfunctorily, as his subsequent mail to me made very explicit. Incidentally, the 20 signed affidavits by victims, which most certainly do exist, were not made available to him as such, not least since merely seeing the signatures would make no difference to Mr. Meyer, who already knew a majority of the accounts involved. The security of certain the victims and their addresses etc. from libel and other actions is protected in such ways until they are to be presented in an Indian court again when the political climate may allow.

Covering up these facts and carefully keeping it all away from those (especially young men) who visit Sai Baba has taken place at least since the now deceased leader in the USA, Dr. J. Hislop, Dr. Goldstein, R. Bozzani, and others were informed of this and of worse sexual abuses early in the 1980s and circulated denials based solely on belief in Sathya Sai Baba to leaders in the Sai organisation. Mr. Robert Bozzani, a leading office-bearer in the SS Organisation, called the reported incident 'old hat' (i.e. ancient news) to one of his previous helpers in the USA.

Though ignorance of the law is no defense, Mr. Meyer has now definitively been informed that genital manipulation without the explicit prior consent of those touched, even by doctors, is an offence punishable by law. If he persists in in failing to inform or young boys and their parents of such practices, he and the office-bearers involved will become legally accountable for not fulfilling the duty of mandatory reporting.