THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE! 

Imagine having been one of the key insiders of Amma’s organisation for over a decade, having dedicated your life to her service and to have developed her mission on the European continent as her official representative. Imagine having been necked out of the organisation for daring to want to be honest and transparent about your path and life choices. And shortly after that, to receive her lawyer’s notice accusing you of crimes you would never have dreamt of committing. Imagine then to be forced to sign an agreement and gagged into silence for thirty whole years in order to be left in peace.

Well, that is what happened to me in 1994 and now that I am no longer legally bound by the gag, compelled to hold my silence about the injustice, I feel it is right to share the truth. Out of the blue, I was accused by my guru’s lawyers of breach of trust, embezzlement and misappropriation of donations. I was in a state of shock and the only way out of this predicament, was to hire a lawyer to protect myself from the wrath of the one I had loved more than my own life. The “Californian” legal attack dogs would not let down until I agreed to sign a judicial transaction in “France” with the “Indian” main branch of the MA organisation. Luckily, before I left India in 1984 to serve the guru in Europe, I had had the presence of mind to request an official power of attorney – a robust protection, in case of need. Who would have dreamt it becoming a key element of protection from the attacks of my own guru? Ten years later, the condition for a discharge from my power of attorney mandate was the submission and approval of bookkeeping for the entire period. Even though I had not been requested to keep accounts at any time, fortunately, once again I had the presence of mind to scrupulously keep every bill and cash receipt, just in case. Without those, I would have been doomed. I then spent seven whole months doing nothing but retroactive accounting covering the 10-year span of activities in the guru’s name. During the same period, after numerous transactions, when the lawyers realised that the way I had conducted activities had been done out of respect and obedience to the guru’s behests, and as such, also her responsibility, and they could not succeed in their accusations, they agreed to settle the issue. The accounting was approved and the legal transaction could finally be signed. But!, of course there was a but… it was that minimum 30-year non-disclosure clause. Whatever I believed and felt, I had no choice but to comply, otherwise there would have been no end to tribulations linked to this litigation based on false accusations. We signed on 29th of July 1994. I was at the same time deeply relieved and distraught.

What was in that agreement that had to remain so secret? What was the clause about? What were they trying to hide? In the first place, I was being gagged about the very existence of the transaction. Beyond that, specifically, it was about the transfer to the newly formed legal non-profit entity of remaining donation money in bank accounts and property of the centre.

Emotions had to subside and I needed time to understand. Because, all these years, I had just obeyed the guru and tried to make things right with the freedom that remained. I later understood it was about hiding the fact that the wrongdoings and transgressions they had unsuccessfully tried to make me shoulder during this shameless litigation, attempting to drown me financially, socially and silence me forever, were in fact based on plain obedience to the guru’s behests. But abuse and malpractices were not foreign to this organisation. Even a cursory look at my book, “The Amma Empire”, will reveal a never-ending list of them. Peculiar for a spiritual and religious organisation pretending to uphold high moral and spiritual values. Values such as respect, love and service of humankind, for which tens of millions of dollars in donations were collected every year already thirty years ago. 

What made this situation even more egregious was that the guru had me falsely accused by her lawyers, “after” having thrown me out of the organisation, because I refused to be another clerical lie: a teaching senior monk and sole European representative with a hidden sentimental and sexual life on the side. Indeed, I felt that abandoning the robes and returning to lay life was an evolution, not a regression, as it implied rigorous proof and integration of values and spiritual achievements in the world and a move closer to the people. I did not dream of leaving the fold or abandoning my sacerdotal duties. But that did not fit in the guru’s concept of things.

To make matters even worse, all this happened after twenty years of absence from the Government radar in France. So, there I was without any personal resources, unable to claim social services or officially seek employment and earn a living. My name had already been sullied by the guru and her disciples and my network destroyed with their lies. So, I had nowhere to go and could turn to no one. Those who read my book will remember how the mother of compassion, when necking me out, requested me initially to go live in any country where she was unknown. She refused my honesty and felt that being a humble and honest dude was not a good idea. It was much better to be a VIP fraud. Keeping up appearances was paramount.

So, what was the deal? In a nutshell, the organisation’s activities were on the rise in Europe, and during her programs an ever-growing amount of donations were collected. Particularly in France, where many bank cheques were given by devotees, such cheques had to be deposited in accounts before being forwarded to India as a lumpsum. In the various countries where the organisation was active and programmes were taking place, that is in the UK, France, Germany and Switzerland, (in Italy the organisation was different), I had approached legal experts and consultants and made plans for setting up legal non-profit entities with their respective bank accounts to receive and transfer what had become amounts with up to six digits. But, as described in detail in the book, every time I came to her with proposals of legitimising her activities locally, she flatly refused. She insisted that everything, including the accounts in which donation and sales’ money were received, should be held in my personal name. Later, this even included the first property of the MA Centre in Europe. For whatever reason, she insisted the title be held in my personal name too.

You should have seen the expressions of the bank tellers when I appeared with a rucksack and stashes of cheques which had to be individually countersigned and dated, sometimes for a couple of hours, in their presence. Naturally bank managers were alerted and I came under scrutiny as to the source of all these funds. When they heard my answers as to what the origin of the money was and as to why it all had to be on my “private” accounts they always looked dubious. They obviously suspected me of dealing drugs or any similar illegal activity. I was met with numerous vested warnings to inform the fiscal and social authorities. But I continued unperturbed, anchored in my faith and in my desire to work for the greater good by way of my beloved guru.

The faith of many were challenged through this reckless and disrespectful attitude of Amma’s. For example, the devotee who sold her personal home and donated all the proceeds from the bottom of her heart for the purchase of a Centre in France was shocked when she realised that it had to be donated to me, as a private individual. Due to the guru’s negligence, I risked being prosecuted in these countries, particularly in France where some of the possible charges that could have been levelled against me were not bound by statute of limitations. Administrations were starting to ask questions, like the Administration for Social Contributions and Benefits in France who was looking upon the regular work done by selfless devotee workers in the new centre as unpaid and undeclared labour. Since there was no legal entity, I was considered the unscrupulous employer. That was a serious offence.

So, in the name of the guru refusing to abide by any rule, the Californian lawyers accused me of embezzlement, breach of trust and misappropriation of donations for my personal use. In reality, I had nothing that was mine, except a car, with which I travelled 10,000 kms a month to give satsangs in various places in Europe – car of which I was reimbursing the credit with my earnings from independent lectures and workshops, when the guru herself had told me I should stop running activities on a voluntary basis. At first in 1984, I squatted in an 8 sqm maid’s room in the non-insulated attic of an old apartment house, without bathroom and heating. Then I squatted for many years in the loggia of a sports hall without proper bathroom facilities. I was sleeping on that concrete floor, my head literally just a few meters away from major railway lines in Paris. I had fitted plywood panels to close it off and create a somewhat private space. Only since the centre had been purchased in a mountainous region of France, did I have a “room” of my own, if one can call it that: a small wooden loggia spun 3 meters across and above the tall entrance hall, 2 meters deep, without window and without heating, again walled-off by some plywood. There was a mattress on the floor and a small shelf. Most of my time in the centre was spent working in the office anyway. I often sank to the floor under my desk in exhaustion in the dead of night or in the wee hours of the morning, not without directing a spotlight close to my face so that I wouldn’t sleep longer than a couple of hours and get up again to continue working for as long as I could manage. Not certain how such a standard of living and dedication equated to the misuse of donation money.

Forget liberation, enlightenment or finding God! My reward for having dedicated all this energy, all these years in the service of my beloved guru, in her name and officially mandated by her, was having to defend myself from the consequences of her thoughtlessness and duplicity, as from the onslaught of her legal attack dogs. Years of spiritual search had culminated into my encounter with her, then later teaching in her name, taking people into the fold, and serving her to the point of transgressing the law out of respect and obedience. Only to find out I had to carry her dirty secrets for a minimum of thirty years because neither she nor her organisation wanted to take public responsibility for the violations committed. Especially after failing to utilise every immoral, albeit judicial, means to try to shove them onto her seemingly helpless representative and faithful servant. 

The message here, apart from the fact that she and her organisation bear zero accountability, is that even if you serve her loyally for years, the “divine mother” will not hesitate to throw you under the bus to save face. Thirty years later, I have long moved on and do not feel a victim. But revealing yet another aspect of the corruption at the heart of this organisation, one is reminded of how outrageous this disgraceful masquerade is.