The Man Who Dared to Play God


The Illustrated Weekly of India, December 11, 1988

By Mahesh Bhatt

Stranded in an emotional wasteland, Mahesh Bhatt sought succour with the grand merchandiser of ecstasy, Bhagwan Rajneesh. What were those heady days like? The movie-maker looks back on that kaleidoscopic experience, on the Bhagwan's birthday this week.


Life is pain. There is no use asking why it is so. It is so. One's search for answers, one's quest for freedom, moksha, enlightenment, God, are nothing but remedies to avoid pain. No wonder people have relied upon messiahs, mahatmas, avatars. Hoping that through them they shall reach that state of uninterrupted happiness.


It was this hope, this hunt for some spiritual morphine which brought me in contact with Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh—the charismatic giant of our times—the man who dared to play God.


The streets of Bombay are littered with memories of half-lived yesterdays. Nostalgia is pain. I wonder what impels me to scan through those days in which I made a wasteland out of everything I touched. Perhaps it is gratifying to give form and shape to unhappiness. Putting it down on paper seems to lessen the pain. All art is born out of this overriding compulsion to expose the secrets of the heart to someone, somewhere, somehow, and often, just to oneself.


FLASHBACK


Those were the days of living dangerously. Those were the days of reading Jonathan Livingston Seagull, listening to John Lennon and having LSD.


It is not always possible to wander backward through the blur of the years and remember the exact moment when you met someone. But in the case of Rajneesh I can even now remember vividly the moment I was initiated into sanyas.


It was cold, very cold that late evening in Koregaon Park, Pune. The silence in that portico was unbearable. A handful of devotees and I waited for the Bhagwan to come out and give us what was called darshan in their jargon. Vijay Anand, who was then one of the few privileged devotees who had direct access to the Bhagwan, had made this meeting possible. Suddenly, he was there. Folded hands, frozen smile, wearing a milky-white robe. Intimidated by an overwhelming sense of powerlessness and insignificance, I fell at his feet.


How desperate I was to believe that here was the man who would protect me and make me believe that life is the fairy tale I wished for it to be. That if I was good and followed all that he said, I would once again believe that I have a significant place in this fair universe. ‘Don't be frightened. Give your hand in my hand and leave the rest to me… will you become my sanyasi—you will have to wear orange and this mala on your neck.’ His stare sent shivers through my entire being. ‘Yes,’ I stammered. ‘Your name will now be Swami Mahesh Bharti—you are twice born now. Today is your real birthday. Wearing orange and this mala is a symbol of the commitment you make to me on this journey. You are now my responsibility….’


With that I became a part of the fast growing commune of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. When I walked out of the gates of the ashram, I was free of that feeling of dread and anxiety. The illusion that you now have someone to look after you, someone who would take all your decisions is very comforting when your core is threatened by life's exposure.


‘Are there any boots to walk on the thorns?’ someone asked UG once. ‘There are no thorns,’ he replied. Unsatisfied, the questioner pursued, ‘The thorns are very much there for me.’ With quiet patience he was answered, ‘Stop looking for the roses, and there will be no thorns.’ But Rajneesh was offering boots to walk on the thorns. It took me two-and-a-half years to realise that the rose garden he promised was, in fact, a land of thorns.


Memories gush through my head. Pretending can make life richer and more colourful or at least more tolerable. The Rajneesh ashram was indeed a paradise. Those ecstatic mornings after the discourse, the euphoria after the meditation and that sacred feeling in the Bhagwan's presence filled me with unusual vigour. Existence blushed for some time. And then one day—call it providence, destiny or a mishap, I met this enigma called UG. ‘Meditation is warfare. There is no such thing as God. It is the mind that has created God out of fear. There is no ultimate reality, no God—nothing. Fear itself is the problem, not God.’


I had by accident touched a live wire. His words blazed through my guts. They jolted me out of the spiritual coma I had sunk into. I was back on the roller coaster of life, afraid of living once again.


‘I feel lost and alone, I am frightened and full of doubt, once again, help me,’ I said to the Bhagwan that evening when we met again. He stared at me and then—gently—placed his hand on my head, and said, ‘Jesus too was seized by such doubt when he was being crucified. “Oh God, why hast thou forsaken me,” he screamed, doubting that God was not with him. But as soon as he had uttered these words he saw for himself that God was very much by his side. I am very much with you. Every breath you take. Every move you make. I'll be watching you.’ That evening he gave me a gift. His white robe. ‘Wear this, Mahesh. Everything will be fine. You are doing well.’ His words comforted me. He told us things we wanted to hear. Unfortunately, this feeling of well-being was not lasting. One had to go back again and again to the ashram front office begging for one more darshan. I was like a drug addict desperately hunting for his next fix. Rajneesh became my crutch.


It was a paradox. My quest for freedom was transformed into a trap, a prison from which I blurted concepts of liberty and independence. But somewhere within me a wound festered. The garbage sack of words became a burden. A treasure one could never drop. ‘You can run, but you can't hide. You can lie to the whole world, but you cannot lie to yourself.’ I knew the end was close. The walls of paradise began to crack. My God was being unveiled.


He was dying. And there was nothing I could do.


‘It was inevitable,’ I said to myself as I watched the remains of my broken mala disappear down the drain. It felt so strange to be free of the dog collar that had kept me on a leash for two-and-a-half years. I was tired. Tired of the life I was leading. I was tired of the man I was. I would not claim for a moment that these years spent in the Rajneesh ashram contributed in any way towards the art of self-improvement. Progress is an illusion. ‘If books and talks could change people, this world would become a paradise.’ It is a random universe to which we bring meaning. Yet, how strange that so often it all seems worth it.


A chapter in my life had finished. A new chapter began. ‘Bhagwan is very angry with you, Mahesh. I am shooting at Filmistan studios, come over right away. I have his message to pass on,’ said Vinod Khanna, a few days after my breakup with Rajneesh. News about my dumping the mala down the commode had got to the ashram. I was ready for the repercussions. ‘Why, Mahesh, why? Why did you do that?’ asked Vinod. His concern for me was absolute. It has always been so. ‘I have never seen Bhagwan in such a temper. He wants you to come back to the ashram and hand over the mala back to him in person. It's a breach of trust on your part. He says, he worked so hard on you. If you don't do that, he says he will destroy you, Mahesh…’ He looked at me as if my days were now numbered. There was a burning silence in the makeup room.


I had rebelled against God. His wrath was now directed at me.


I was angry. He had given discourses on ‘unconditional love’, spoken at great length about how detestable it was for man to be possessive. It was disgusting now to see him behave just like any jolted lover unable to swallow a rejection. He was just a wordsmith peddling half-truths, high sounding phrases and holy concepts. That's what people wanted. Not the blunt facts. Who's afraid of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh? ‘Get up,’ I said to myself. ‘Get up on your own two feet, however shaky they are, and walk.’ Once I did that there was no looking back.


SLOWLY FADE OUT.FADE IN.SIX YEARS LATER


‘Tragedy picks out its players without regard for position or fame.’ A small new item in a Hindi daily: ‘Rajneesh arrested in America’ signalled that ‘God’ was in a fix.


I was in Ranikhet scouting locations for a film. The news surprisingly saddened me. My friend Suraj Sanim, who was also once a Rajneesh sanyasi, prophesied the end.


A few days later when I returned back to Bombay the drama had enlarged. ‘We must protest, Mahesh. They are humiliating him. It does not matter whether we care a damn for what he stands for. We cannot look the other way when the American government is deriving sadistic pleasure by handcuffing him and parading him before the world media,’ screamed Pritish. Pritish Nandy. He was perhaps the only person who initiated a protest. The rest just watched this tragic comedy with kinky delight. He had asked for it.


LAP DISSOLVE


‘Rajneesh is back, he is here in the Juhu-Vile Parle scheme in Bombay, living in Sumila bungalow,’ said Suraj. ‘Let us meet him,’ I said.


The meeting was fixed within 30 minutes of our asking. Why was I seeing him, I asked myself. Was it for old times sake, curiosity, or was it out of this savage craving to see ‘God’ humbled. As a child I recall those mornings after the Ganpati immersions. I would run to the seashore relishing the sight of broken gods.


Even in that mournful ambience he has retained his lonely splendour. Everything else about the scene was hollow and colourless. It was cold, very cold there in that room. He stood up to receive us, folding his hands. Our eyes met. Memories ripped through the air for an instant. Time stood still for a couple of seconds. Then reality rushed with terrifying clarity down in the room. We were not the same. Nor was the world. Six years is a long, long time. Something was dangerously off-key. His well manicured hands were shaky. That familiar look in his eyes. That glee of insanity. There was that sense of a beast in convulsion.


‘Do you really think you can help people to get enlightened? Look at your sanyasis. They all want to become like you. You are their model. Do you have anything apart from words to offer…?’ He blocked my question saying, ‘I can, but remember I want them to realise their own potential. If they are trying to ape me it is wrong. If not, that also is fine with me. Failure does not depress me…’ His words lacked certainty. They did not have a breath of feeling. I steered the conversation to J Krishnamurti. ‘JK died of pancreatic cancer. It is shocking for us, common folk, to see such a great man die of such a dreadful ailment. Why does this happen…?’


‘All enlightened men are sick,’ he smiled and said, ‘but all sick people are not enlightened. You see, the body of such a person becomes very vulnerable after enlightenment… but he does not suffer like everyone else, because he knows he is not only the physical form…’


He was wrong. Recently I read a detailed account of the last days of JK in a book called The Open Door by Mary Lutyens. The pages are full of vivid descriptions of how painful JK's end was.


‘I as a film-maker realise that I am in business because people are lonely. Don't you think that you are in the business because people are miserable? Even JK, towards the end, said that unfortunately he, too, had become a part of the entertainment industry….’


‘What is wrong with entertainment? People are unhappy. Why should one not relieve them of their woes for a while by entertaining them?’


The interview was way past the granted time of 15 minutes. His aide was getting restless. We were there now for almost an hour. But when God speaks no one interrupts. There was a bleak, heavy feeling in the room. The conversation was laboured. Finally I asked, ‘Why did you attack Pritish Nandy, saying that what he writes is “yellow journalism”? Somehow those words “yellow journalism” did not seem fair. Do you know it was he who stood up for you while you were in jail…?’ The question hit a raw nerve. It activated that which was lurking behind his godly façade. Madness erupted.


‘Pritish has been purchased by the American government. The CIA has given him thousands of dollars. Reagan is out to nail me. They are influencing the entire world not to grant me refuge. America could not put up with what I was creating there in Oregon. They tried to poison me, kept me in a cell with a victim of AIDS.’ He went on and on, elaborating on the same issue of how the American government and Reagan were trying to destroy him.


The sight was heart-breaking. I was reminded of Parveen Babi and her recurrent bouts of madness. He needed help, medical help. When we left, he was getting ready to leave for his evening discourse. He reminded me of a tired actor whose peak has long passed. Pulling himself together to get ready for the next shot. That's entertainment.


The events of my life have reduced me to what I really am. Life seems empty, meaningless. I stare at a message from UG's latest book, Mind Is a Myth. ‘Why should life have any meaning? Why should there be a purpose to living? Living itself is all that is there.’


Everything around tells me life is transient. That all is in flux. God is a fairy tale that no longer comforts me. Yet my wish to continue somehow persists. I need to believe. ‘You will replace one belief with another,’ says UG. ‘You are nothing but belief, and when it dies you are dead.’ The game of snakes and ladders goes on. I am back where I started. There is no way out. ‘There's no oasis situated yonder. You are stuck with the mirage.’


‘What do you finally have to say about this man called Rajneesh, papa?’ asked Pooja my teenaged daughter while I was reading this unfinished piece to her. Here is the answer. I think Rajneesh's life is perhaps the greatest success story of recent times. I salute the audacity with which he went all out to get what he wanted. I admire his guts for still keeping his act going. Success is the only measure through which culture tests our worth. He is a winner in that framework. The number one man in the holy business. But at the end of it all he is just an entertainer. A pleasure peddler.


Who amongst us, to be honest, does not want to play God? Every politician, every gangster, journalist, parent, artist, social worker, you name it. The ultimate ambition of man is to play God. That is the highest goal culture has placed before us.


When I look back on my life with its successes and its failures and its endless errors, I do not have any sense of regret meeting Rajneesh. At least sometimes I can boastfully say, ‘Yes, I once met this man who dared to play God.’

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