Time magazine.November 27, 1972.
Prem Rawat (Prem Pal Singh Rawat) whose devotees call him Maharaji (meaning Ultimate Ruler) first came to attention in the West as Guru Maharaj Ji - the self-proclaimed Perfect Master and Lord of the Universe ridiculed in the media as a fat, squeaky-voiced God boy. He had inherited his titles and position as the Satguru, The True Revealer of Light and Spiritual Master of the Divine Light Mission, India (Divya Sandesh Parishad) when his father died in 1966. His father, Hans Rawat, was a successful Indian guru, self titled HRH (His Royal Highness) Yogiraj Param Sant Satgurudev Shri Hans Ji Maharaj. As a child the youngest Rawat son was informally called Sant Ji, more formally Balyogeshwar ("Born King of the Yogis") and even more formally Param Sant Satgurudev Shri Sant Ji Maharaj. In the West Rawat dropped these more verbose titles in the early 1980's and instructed his followers to call him Maharaji. He has also changed the names of his organisations many times: Divine Light Mission (DLM), World Welfare Association (WWA), World Peace Corps (WPC) and Divine United Organisation (DUO) became Elan Vital in the early 1980's and in 2001 The Prem Rawat Foundation (TPRF) was created and from 2010 his major orgs are Words Of Peace Global (WOPG) registered in Holland, Words of Peace International (WOPI) in the USA, HDSK (Human Development through Self Knowledge) in Great Britain and Raj Vidya Kender (Royal Knowledge Society) in India. He no longer claims to be an Incarnation of God but an internationally famous humanitarian leader and teacher of peace. He's neither.
Time magazine.
November 27, 1972.
He is called Balyogeshwar Param Hans Satgurudev Shri Sant Ji Maharaj -hardly a name likely to become a household word. A little over a year ago only a handful of people outside India knew who he was. But last fortnight, when Guru Maharaj Ji (as he is short-titled) flew from the U.S. to New Delhi to celebrate a three-day festival in honor of his late guru father, he was accompanied by seven jumbo jets filled with new followers from the West. They were only a fraction of the number he had left behind.
No venerable ascetic in flowing white beard and robes, the latest star from the East to hit the guru circuit is a plump, cherubic 14-year-old, lightly mustachioed with peach fuzz, his neatly trimmed black hair slicked back. He dines on vegetables-liberally supplemented by mounds of Baskin-Robbins ice cream. He does not practice yoga or formal meditation (having surpassed, he says, the need for it), but he has a passion for squirt guns and triple Creature Features horror movies.
The Maharaj Ji's mother and three older brothers literally worship him, kissing his "lotus feet" whenever they are in his presence. To them as to his other followers, he is the "Perfect Master" and "Lord of the Universe." By their testimony, the Maharaj Ji began, while still a toddler, to deliver inspired satsangs (sermons)-and to amaze the devotees of his father (then the Perfect Master) by awakening them in the morning with the exhortation, "Get up, get up. Do meditation! If you don't, I will beat you with a stick!"
Silver Steed. When his father died, the Maharaj Ji was eight. "I didn't want to be the guru," he says. "I would have been satisfied to be a mischievous little boy. But a voice came to me saying, "You are he; you are to continue." At the funeral, therefore, he confronted his father's mourning flock: "Why are you weeping? The Perfect Master never dies. Maharaj Ji is here, amongst you."
Four years later, in 1970, Guru Maharaj Ji inaugurated his international mission with a triumphal ride through Delhi in a golden chariot, trailed by miles of elephants, camels and devotees. In 1971 the master's American premies (loved ones) heralded his advent in the U.S. with a press release stating: "He is coming in the clouds with great power and glory, and his silver steed will drift down at 4 p.m. at Los Angeles international airport, TWA Flight 761." That was enough to attract a coterie of guru buffs and various other seekers. In little over a year their number has swelled to some 30,000 youthful followers who man "Divine Light" centers in 45 states.
The teen-age master suggests a stringent life-style for his devotees, devoid of drugs, sex, tobacco and alcohol. In exchange he offers the gift of knowledge designed to open the initiate's "third eye" of inner awareness and thus bring him perpetual peace. Knowledge sessions sometimes last twelve hours or more and are conducted by 2,000 delegated mahatmas throughout the world. "If you can become perfect," the Maharaj Ji told his disciples in Delhi's Ram Lila Grounds last week, "you can see God. That's the way I did it."
A Great Kid. The premies adore their chubby guru, despite his frustrating habit of showing up hours late for rallies or sometimes not at all. "People who stick to their schedules become like a rock," he explains. As a mark of their devotion, his premies wear their hair short and shave their beards. Makeshift barber chairs were set up in Air India's lounge at Kennedy Airport in New York to shear some lingering longhairs before the Divine Light pilgrims took off for the Delhi festival. The grateful faithful have also laden their lord with gifts, including a Rolls-Royce, a Mercedes and two private planes.
When he and his devotees landed in New Delhi, customs officials thought they had caught the Perfect Master with an embarrassment of riches-a suitcase containing diamonds and other jewels plus $65,000 worth of undeclared foreign currency. The guru's retainers claimed that the money amounted to only $12,000 and represented excess funds from their Divine Bank for travel expenses. The jewels, they said, were the "gifts of devotees from many nations" to the Lord of the Universe. Indian officials were unconvinced, and launched an investigation.
The amiable young master remained unperturbed at the airport as he smilingly greeted his followers from a marigold-decorated throne set up on the back of a Jeep. "The amazing thing about him," said his private secretary, Gary Girard of Los Angeles, "is that he can meditate 24 hours a day no matter what is happening."
Prem Rawat's "Knowledge" has three parts: regularly listening to his speeches, doing voluntary work for organisations serving him or donating money and daily meditation correctly practicing the four techniques he recommends. The techniques are so simple it's hard to see how they could be practiced incorrectly. First technique ("Divine Light") involves sticking your thumb and middle finger on your eyeballs (NB: with eyes closed) and your index finger between your eyebrows. Second technique: ("Heavenly Music") poking your thumbs into your ears and listening. Third technique: ("Holy Name") thinking about your breathing (NB: continue to breathe). Fourth technique: ("Nectar") curling your tongue backwards and tasting. Rawat's father taught slightly different techniques but either way it's difficult to see how these could produce the benefits claimed for them especially as Rawat claims His Knowledge is the only method of attaining real happiness and love in this life.
