Ravi S. Iyer: Spiritual

Last updated on 22nd April 2020 22nd April 2020 Update: I had an inner urge to name-snip the names of some person(s) in this post and so have done so. A recent Facebook post of Mr. V.R.Ganti, https://www.facebook.com/notes/vr-ganti/local-villagers-over-power-the-fraudsters-history-is-being-made-hope-dharma-prev/10208615545050727 , states that Shri Gangadhar Bhat who is 84 years old, and working at Alike school for 50 years, has been ousted from the board of trustees of Sri Sathya Sai Loka Seva trust. The post also states that three persons from Muddenahalli group including the new chairman of Loka Seva trust came over to Alike school yesterday (24th Jan. 2017). Shri Gangadhar Bhat was asked to leave Alike school premises. The locals of Alike who revere Shri Gangadhar Bhat protested at this move. I have given below the comment (slightly edited) I put up on the above mentioned post: I am very disturbed to see that Shri Gangadhar Bhat has been treated in this manner. I am reminde

Given below are some comments from Mr. V.R. Ganti's Facebook post, https://www.facebook.com/notes/vr-ganti/is-end-of-rathnakar-raj-in-the-offing-subbaiah-medical-college-fraud-case-part-1/10208576289309358 , dated Jan. 21st 2017 Vr Ganti wrote (slightly edited): --snip-- Ravi S. Iyer you made it absolutely clear to me that no matter whatever crime that may be done by --snip--, you will support him and hence, I am not request you to watch, though I am certain you would have watched. ---- Ravi S. Iyer wrote: Vr Ganti sir, I challenge you to show me where I have told you that I support anything and everything that any trustee of SSSCT does. You are saying Asathya when you say that. Your hatred for some people is clouding your discrimination between Sathya & Asathya. My stand on SSSCT trustees is that I typically avoid criticising them (though on a few rare occasions I have criticized them in a mild way). I benefit from SSSCT provided services to Puttaparthi town and so i

Mr. V.R. Ganti put up a post today (22nd Jan. 2017) about Shri Gangadhar Bhat sharing the dais with trustees of Sri Sathya Sai Central Trust (SSSCT) for a Bhagavan's Padukas installation function ("SAI CHARAN" DEDICATION CEREMONY) at Dharwad Women's college today, https://www.facebook.com/notes/vr-ganti/swami-is-definitely-guiding-gangadhar-bhats-camp-another-slap-on-mhalli-gang-ali/10208583894779490 . Note that Dharwad is in Karnataka state of India. Given below is a pic from Mr. Ganti's post showing Shri Gangadhar Bhat and SSSCT trustees and perhaps the Karnataka (official) Sathya Sai orgn. top functionary(ies). [Thanks for the pic Mr. Ganti.] Mr. Ganti writes that Shri Gangadhar Bhat who heads the Alike school of Sri Sathya Sai Loka Seva trust is working independently of Muddenahalli camp in various functions that he is involved in. Given below is my comment on that post of Mr. Ganti (which I also put up as a shared Facebook post here: https://www.fa

Given below are some comments of mine from this recent Facebook post, https://www.facebook.com/ravirajsalyankar/posts/10154376469023721 : Ravi S. Iyer wrote: Vr Ganti sir, Swami's students (alumni) who serve in Prasanthi Nilayam system seem to have got squeezed by multiple pressures. Earlier itself before Mahasamadhi, they rarely spoke in public without Bhagavan's permission. They are conditioned to obey orders of Prasanthi Nilayam bosses on matters dealing with public contact. Further, they have strong emotional ties to Prasanthi Nilayam system and so perhaps have some fear of strong action being taken against them by Prasanthi Nilayam bosses if they say something PN bosses view as inappropriate in public. Silence in public has always been a safe way to survive in PN system. Now, it is many alumni who are supporting Muddenahalli group and whose communicator, Madhusudan Naidu, is himself an alumni! So any alumni who speak publicly against Muddenahalli group are asking

Last updated on 19th Jan. 2017 [Note: I have put this up on my spiritual blog instead of my miscellaneous topics blog, as my whistle blowing activity, referred below, was related to Prasanthi Nilayam system in immediate post-Mahasamadhi traumatic period.] As I have been a much smaller scale and within Indian law whistle-blower (in 2015 & 2016) of some matters in immediate post-Mahasamadhi (period of April end 2011 - around mid 2012) Prasanthi Nilayam system (Puttaparthi, India) including and mainly Sathya Sai university (SSSIHL) related matters, I have an absorbing interest in contemporary and near-contemporary famous whistleblowers in the world. Wikileaks - Julian Assange & Chelsey Manning (formerly Bradley Manning) - and Edward Snowden were the really big whistleblowers, news accounts of whom, I followed quite a bit in the last decade or so. They have surely played a role in inspiring me to become a whistle-blower (using Facebook and blogger) in 2015 & 2016 with an

Last updated on 18th Jan 2017 In Facebook post, https://www.facebook.com/vr.ganti.1/posts/10208518716910084 , published on Jan. 14th 2017, I had the following comment exchanges with Mr. V.R. Ganti and Mr. Alok Dara Shikoh. Ravi S. Iyer wrote (slightly edited): Vr Ganti sir, I am a supporter of SSSCT (Sri Sathya Sai Central Trust) in general. The plain fact of the matter is that when Swami was in physical form, that physical form drew donors and service minded people towards him like a magnet. Now that physical form is not there. SSSCT has done a great job in ensuring that even without the magnetic physical form presence they have kept all the ashram institutions functioning. To retain full time paid staff SSSCT seems to have had no choice but to increase salaries significantly after Mahasamadhi. These are the realities on the ground. Blaming SSSCT for anything and everything is wrong. They are doing their best given the challenges, including the Muddenahalli group divisive chall

Last updated on 20th Jan. 2017 In a comment exchange between Mr. Alok Dara Shikoh and me, in Mr. V.R. Ganti's recent Facebook post, https://www.facebook.com/vr.ganti.1/posts/10208531985201783  (see branch comments under one of V.R. Ganti's comments which begins with a reference to me), Mr. Alok Dara Shikoh wrote that he is agnostic towards MDH (Muddenahalli belief in so called communicator and so called subtle body). But about the view that Bhagavan has said that he does not communicate through mediums (or communicators), he offered two possibilities. Possibility1 that "event-1" (events) occur(s) as Bhagavan said they would. I (Ravi) take Possibility1 as having an implication that Bhagavan does not use mediums for his communications even after Mahasamadhi. Mr. Shikoh then raised Possibility2 that "event-1 does not occur in the way Bhagawan said it(.) (W)hat actually happens is contradictory to what Bhagawan said (again as analyzed by my limited mind and its

Last updated on 5th Dec 2018 In response to a Facebook post somewhere, and comment exchanges there, I wrote a post on Facebook whose main contents are given below. I think brother VijaySai B.S. must ponder over the misguidance damage and associated negative karmic consequences of the impersonation of some aspects of Sathya Sai (discourses, interviews, some aspects of darshan) that the so called communicator, Madhusudan Rao Naidu is doing. Yesterday somebody told me that he had met Shri B.N. Narasimhamurthy (BNNM) in person after Mahasamadhi and after he had started making claims that Swami was giving him instructions but before Madhusudan Rao Naidu had started playing this role in Muddenahalli group. This person said that at that time he asked BNNM whether he could see/glimpse this (subtle body) Swami, and BNNM told him that he (BNMM) could actually glimpse/see this subtle body Swami!!! We are not talking dream instructions here, mind you. This is the first time I have heard of

Last updated on 12th Jan 2017 Prof. Vinayak Krishna Gokak, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinayaka_Krishna_Gokak , was a scholar of Kannada and English literature as well as an acclaimed writer in Kannada winning the Jnanpith award in 1990 for his epic, Bharatha Sindhu Rashmi, which the wiki says dealt with the Vedic age. He was earlier awarded the Padmashree in 1961 for another work of his in Kannada, Dyava Pruthvi. I am now re-reading his book, Bhagavan Sri Sathya Sai Baba, The Man and the Avatar, an interpretation. What struck me is how knowledgeable about Sathya Sai, Prof. V.K. Gokak, the 1st vice-chancellor (VC) of Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning (Sai university), was. BTW he was VC from 1981 to 1985. I thought of sharing a few paragraphs from the initial chapters of the book that I have re-read so far. They are given below: [From pages 18-22 of the paperback version of the book:] An avatar is a paradox cut in the image of the Divine. He is divine though huma