MAHARAJI RESPONSIBILITY CAMPAIGN
MaharajiResponsibilityCampaign@hotmail.com

June 9, 2000

Dear Mr. Rawat a.k.a. Maharaji,

We are concerned premies, former premies, and the families and loved ones of both. We are writing to request an honest dialogue with you regarding a number of unresolved issues resulting from an important period in our lives - - a period in which you played a crucial role.

When you first came to the West in 1971, you presented yourself, by your words and your actions, as "Perfect Master," a divine being worthy of devotion and worship. Your devotees, in turn, signed over trust funds, gave you extravagant gifts, literally kissed your feet, and approached you with unmitigated awe and reverence. You also threatened your followers with dire circumstances that would befall them should they ever stop practicing your teachings, known as "Knowledge," move out of one of your monastic ashrams (prior to when you summarily closed the ashrams in 1983), or even entertain doubts about Knowledge or you. Thus, you created a climate of fear that ultimately limited your followers' personal development.

We, especially those of us who call ourselves former premies, accept our responsibility for allowing ourselves to be led to believe in you as one worthy of worship and devotion. However, you also have a deep moral responsibility to address these issues and to explain publicly your motivations for your behavior, to take responsibility for your actions, and to explain the steps you are taking to ensure that worship of you does not continue or recur. We also feel you have a responsibility to dissuade, without equivocation, your current followers from the notion that you are a more perfect human being than they themselves are.

Some of your former followers feel that Knowledge has some value. Others consider it a quite ordinary set of meditation techniques. We feel, however, that the most honest way to teach Knowledge would be to dismantle all things that are cult-like about your organization, especially the notion that you are a divine being, that you are worthy of worship, or that you have special powers. In fact, we suggest, if you want to continue to teach Knowledge in the 21st century, that it would be brave and revolutionary for you to demonstrate real leadership by dismantling and purging all of the cult-like aspects from your organization and your leadership role within it.

Specifically, the first step should be to honestly address the past by taking full responsibility for presenting yourself as a "Perfect Master," worthy of worship and devotion. All familiar with you know that you were groomed from childhood to play this role. Nevertheless, you are now 42 years old and have been an American citizen for almost 25 years. The time has long since passed when you should have openly declared that your claims about your divinity, made as an adolescent and as a young adult, were simply not true. The honest declaration of your errors, and admission that you are a human being with all of the qualities and flaws that constitute the human condition, would undo much of what is most cult-like about you and your organization. It might even earn you the respect of the world outside your organization in a way you have never dreamed possible.

While we are aware that you have initiated certain changes to eliminate some of the Hindu trappings of your organization, we are very concerned that you continue to reinforce in your followers the belief that you are divine. For example, as late as 1997, you allowed your followers to line up and kiss your feet in Australia. What other conclusion can one reach about a person who allows his followers to kiss his feet? Moreover, based on our interactions with your current followers, many of them, especially those who received Knowledge in the 70s and 80s, still believe you are divine. Since they are predisposed to believe this, you are in the best position to dissuade them, not just by your words but also by your actions.

We believe that such actions would benefit your stated aim of teaching Knowledge to anyone who is sincerely interested. With the advent of the Internet, your ex-followers are now communicating in significant numbers with each other and to others about you and your past. We believe that this extensive interest is due mainly to the fact that you have failed to address these issues and put them behind you. Until you do so, they will continue to haunt you publicly. We are already seeing many people who were interested in Knowledge lose interest when they read about your past on the Internet. They are disillusioned because that information was not disclosed to them by you or your instructors in the aspirant process. As more people become connected to the Internet, this process will only accelerate, significantly undermining your mission.

Besides clarifying your role, we suggest that you transform your organization so that it becomes the first "former" cult in history to institute safeguards against ever becoming a cult again. For example, members might receive a text outlining the characteristics of cults and mind control and how to recognize them. Such a text could become required reading before you agree to teach anyone. We believe this would make your followers more independent, with greater opportunity for personal growth. Perhaps your teachings might have value, on their own merits, without a cult-like belief system. You have a great opportunity. We urge you to consider it.

This is our challenge to you. We request that you step down from your pedestal and join your brothers and sisters in the human race. Find your place among us. Treat us as equals with the love and respect you always claimed you had for us. Be one of us. It would free us and those premies still trapped in worshipping you. It might free you in many ways as well. There is so much to be gained by everyone.

Please respond to this letter by stating your commitment to achieving the goals described herein, and by creating a forum where an honest dialogue can take place. Of course, no response from you to this sincere, respectful and reasonable request will be seen as a response in and of itself.

Thank you.

Maharaji Responsibility Campaign
MaharajiResponsibilityCampaign@hotmail.com