The End of Elan Vital and the Termination of Maharaji -> 2010

I wanted to write about this event to the background of the Doors playing "This is the End." That would have been right for the end of Divine Light Mission. For the end of Elan Vital and Maharaji a recital by one of those old gay English actors lisping "This is the way the world ends, Not with a bang but a whimper" seems appropriate.

Maharaji was not murdered, he was made redundant, terminated, finished, disappeared and, where possible, removed from the internet and, Rawat hoped, from history. Maharaji never actually existed, 'Maharaji' was a role Prem Rawat played on stage. All that Prem Rawat, formerly known as Maharaji, had to do was order his minions to cancel all their websites glorifying 'Maharaji', phase out the "Prem Rawat also known as Maharaji" quotes and pass the word down through the First Class intranet system or a phone tree in less digitised countries: 'Maharaji' is out, "Prem Rawat" is now his name, wholly. The official version is on Wikipedia:

The Elan Vital organization in the United Kingdom changed its name to HDSK (Human Development through Self Knowledge) at the end of 2009.[6] [7] In April 2010, the Elan Vital website announced that Elan Vital had stopped collecting donations and would cease operations in 2010, to be succeeded by entities such as Words of Peace International, Inc., a new US 501(c)(3) organization "closely aligned with Words of Peace Global (WOPG), the international charitable foundation that promotes Maharaji [4]

For some years 'Maharaji' was used for activities relating to the premies and activities seeking more converts while Prem Rawat was used for activities seeking acknowledgement and respect from the media and the public. Maharaji, however, was not succeeding in gaining new followers in North America, Europe or more sophisticated social classes elsewhere. The Boomer premies were now 60 years or older. They might have money but were not a group to inspire 'propagation'. They were not shining as Rawat claimed they'd been in 1973. This dilution of the brand was achieving nothing and was counter-productive. Whether planned or ad-hoc a phasing out of 'Maharaji' began.

Prem Rawat's 1982-83 volte-face was a severe blow to his finances and the size of his audience and it took the rest of the decade to achieve some stability though his largest Western audience was half of the 20,000 or more he attracted in the 1978 and 79 Hans Jayanti festivals. It could be argued that from 1990 Elan Vital was basically a Vanity Project where the core of his early 1970s boomer "premies" provided him with enough money to organise to live in luxury and spend part of every year flying around the world to wherever he could attract a large enough audience to listen to his speech. These speeches were enough to keep that aging core of 10 or 15,000 PwKs * energised to provide enough volunteer labour and finances to keep the show rolling while never actually achieving their stated role of attracting a new cohort of more followers.

The Inspire Electronic Magazine was an electronic newsletter published by the Prem Rawat Foundation on their website from 2004 to 2010. It usually contained a brief report of a recent speech by Maharaji or a short edited section of one of Maharaji's recent speeches which was also available on subscription. It was published by the Prem Rawat Foundation but until late 2007 all the speeches were by 'Maharaji'. In late 2007 'Maharaji' was replaced by "Prem Rawat."

He was Guru Maharaj Ji for 17 years. He was Maharaj Ji for 17 years

From 'Maharaji' to "Prem Rawat"

The transition from Guru Maharaj Ji and Divine Light Mission to Maharaji and Elan Vital happened quickly at a time when Guru Maharaj Ji/Maharaji/Prem Rawat was attempting (mostly successfully) not to attract any publicity at all and even the premies themselves had to learn of the changes through word-of-mouth in most cases. As far as I know it was only mentioned in the Guardian 20 years later as background to a story about astrology.

In those days the guru described himself as the Lord of the Universe and the Exploding Love-Bomb. Since then, the Divine Light Mission has changed its name to Élan Vital, and its leader now prefers to be known as Maharaji, Perfect Master.

Post 2000, Maharaji apparently decided that more resources should not be wasted in attempting to gain a larger following through the continued scheduling at small venues of videos of himself speaking. These programs were organised and financed by small groups of his followers partly organised into local communities. More resources should be spent trying to gain himself the reputation of a respected, even famous, international speaker for Peace and as a small but significant part of this process this name change should be gradually released by his followers in his organisations' media productions.

Venture: the magazine for business management (Vanity publishing) © 2003 Schofield Media. All rights reserved.
PREM RAWAT INTERVIEW: THE WEALTH WITHIN

Prem Rawat is also known as Maharaji, an honorary title given to him in India where he began his work.

The Prem Rawat Foundation: Inspire Electronic Magazine, Volume 1, Issues 1 - 43, January 2004 - 29/12/2004
Inspire v1 i10: The Universal Quest for Peace

Prem Rawat, also known by the honorary title Maharaji, is a successful investor and receives no compensation for teaching the techniques of Knowledge.

© Ron Geaves, 2006, Journal of Alternative Spiritualities and New Age Studies, 2 44-62.

This paper will focus on the case study of Prem Rawat, also known as Maharaji, and the various organisations used to transmit his teachings.

ADI ADI MAGAZINE, ISSUE #1, 2007

As an advocate for peace, Prem Rawat, widely known as Maharaji, has dedicated his life to helping people find peace within themselves

Followers of Prem Rawat/Maharaji have always been prepared to tell porkies about their Master: Maharaji was never "widely known." Charlie Chaplin was widely known. Adolf Hitler was widely known. Gandhi was widely known. Donald Trump is widely known. Maharaji was known by a few tens of thousands of people out of the 7 billion who didn't live in India. He was known by some hundreds of thousands in India where he is a very minor figure, unlike his eldest brother who is widely known.

Journal of Contemporary Religion
Forget Transmitted Memory: The De-traditionalised 'Religion' of Prem Rawat, Ron Geaves, 2009

I chose the teachings of a contemporary Sant, Prem Rawat or Maharaji, as he is more commonly known.

ADI ADI ISSUE #6 published October 10, 2011

Addressing audiences worldwide, Prem Rawat, known also as Maharaji, delivers his message of peace to many different people.

ADI ISSUE #10 published 21st May 2102

Prem Rawat, also known as Maharaji, delivers his message of peace to many different audiences around the world.

Prem Rawat net worth Oct, 2023: Prem Pal Singh Rawat (born 10 December 1957), formerly known as Maharaji

Wikipedia article 2024 - Prem Rawat

Prem Pal Singh Rawat (born 10 December 1957), formerly known as Maharaji, is an Indian international speaker and author.

The renaming process was well summarised in "Yoga in Britain: Stretching Spirituality and Educating Yogis" by Suzanne Newcombe © 2019.

During the 1970s, a series of internal problems and negative publicity led to Prem Rawat closing all his ashrams in 1982 and reforming his global followers under the name of Élan Vital (1984-2010). By the late 1980s, the movement (then known as Élan Vital) claimed 1,420 committed supporters, who pledged £5 a month to Prem Rawat (then known as Maharaji), with 5,000 on their mailing list and 7,000 individuals practicing his techniques called 'the Knowledge'. Since 2010, Prem Rawat has been teaching 'The Knowledge' under his own name and audiences of 2 to 3,000 on visits to Britain, now largely drawn from the diasporic north Indian population.



Notes:

  1. "www.elanvital.org". Archived from the original on 2010-02-21.

  2. "Elan Vital FAQs - About Elan Vital, Inc". Archived from the original on 2006-09-02.

  3. "1016818-HDSK". Charity Commission. 31 December 2009. Retrieved 22 February 2010.

PwKs = "People with Knowledge," formerly 'premies'