When devotion becomes blind
A spiritual guru with a cult-like following was found guilty of rape, and more than 30 of his followers lost their lives protesting the decision.
I WAS told a year or two ago via a third party that someone was concerned I didn’t have enough religion in my life.
“You can tell her she has too much religion in her life,” I couldn’t resist responding to the conduit in this conversation, who burst out laughing.
And I certainly do feel that there are times when too much faith is placed in those who claim to be bearers of the word of an unseen deity or higher power.
In Malaysia, we have witnessed waves of it.
There were the followers of Ibrahim Libya which led to the 1985 Memali killings, and other groups such as Al-Arqam, Al-Maunah and Ayah Pin’s Sky Kingdom also saw a situation in which groups were built around the personal charisma of a self-proclaimed saviour.
Sometimes, when left unabated, this has led to major societal upheaval and loss of life.
Lately, I have been following the saga of the self-styled “Dr Saint” Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, a man who has been all over the news in India.
The “saintly” Gurmeet received two consecutive 10-year jail sentences after being convicted of raping two female devotees in incidents that date as far back as 1999.
The acts occurred at the lush headquarters of the Dera Sacha Sauda (DSS) sect in Haryana and lawyers for the victims have alleged that Gurmeet raped or assaulted as many as 50 other women who belonged to his group.
Incidentally, if you are wondering why the men in the group didn’t do much to stop the assaults, well, apparently Gurmeet had ordered the castration of 400 of his male followers, and I can scarcely think of more damning proof of his hold over them.
If you are wondering why so many men would blindly surrender their manhood (the reason was ostensibly to get them closer to God), well, your guess is as good as mine!
As a student of such cult movements, I can tell you that the Heaven’s Gate cult which had members committing suicide in 1997, also promoted castration so that they could be “gender-free”.
I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when I read about this guy’s back story.
He was born to cult members and joined at age seven. At 23, he was chosen by the outgoing DSS leader Satnam Singh to take over.
He has built up a name partly by leading his members to undertake charitable works and partly by thinly-veiled propaganda.
This includes recording albums such as Highway Love Charger and making movies such as MSG: Messenger of God. Generally, the bearded behemoth is chanting inane lyrics to vast adoring crowds or speeding around on a series of massive motorbikes to right the wrongs of the world.
To show that he’s quite the worldly man, Gurmeet has managed to harness his large following into a political force courted by both sides of the local political divide in Haryana.
After years of backing Congress, the DSS threw its weight behind the BJP of India’s prime minister Narenda Modi and was part of the vote bank that elected Manohar Lal Khattar as Haryana’s Chief Minister in 2014.
In fact, Modi’s critics accused him of being reluctant to act against the group and its lionised leader.
Well, to be fair, it does look as if justice has bitten the bullet now. Thousands of police officers ensured a tight security presence when Gurmeet was due to be sentenced. And mind you, the judge even had to be flown in by helicopter.
But it wasn’t even to avoid violence as delirious supporters clashed with police, who were operating on a “shoot-on-sight” philosophy. At least 30 died. Just think about it.
Incidentally, the saint is also under suspicion of having ordered the murder of journalist Ram Chander Chhatrapati who was writing investigative pieces on the DSS.
Again, the question that has to be asked is why on earth so many are willing to give their lives for such an obvious conman? Why such unquestioning faith in someone trying to sell you a ticket to paradise?
Star Online news editor Martin Vengadesan thinks that it takes a special sort of naivety to fall for the honeyed words of the cult conmen.