I'm quoted in a story about RSSB center in New Zealand

I just got a link to a Newsroom story by Cass Mason about a new Radha Soami Satsang Beas center in New Zealand. Here's a screenshot of how the story starts out, along with a PDF file of the story. Below I'll share critical mentions of RSSB in the story, along with mentions of an interview Mason did with me. 
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This is the concluding part of the story. I found the final paragraph amusing, though not surprising. Baruch ter Wal won’t comment on allegations of the RSSB guru's involvement in financial fraud, but he’s fine with ascribing motivations to me that don’t fit with reality.

That’s to be expected, since RSSB faithful can’t conceive that someone could find the guru and the RSSB teachings lacking after 35 years of serious devotion to meditation and the other RSSB vows. Instead, my leaving the group must be my own failing.

However, the group is not without its controversies. 

While RSSB’s previous gurus have maintained a low profile, Singh Dhillon has made the news in India for allegations about his involvement in financial scandal.

Singh Dhillon is alleged to have siphoned funds relating to the sale of multinational pharmaceutical company Ranbaxy Laboratories - owned by Singh Dhillon’s cousins, brothers Malvinder and Shivinder Singh - to Japanese global healthcare company Daiichi Sankyo in 2008. 

An affidavit signed by Malvinder Singh in 2019 accused Shivinder of transferring Singh Dhillon more than NZD$100 million in fraudulent loans through shell companies controlled by Singh Dhillon, his family and close associates, money which was then used to buy real estate. 

“Shivinder initiated these actions and permitted siphoning and malfeasance of funds with the ulterior motive of gaining control of the seat of the spiritual head of RSSB, which was promised to him by Dhillon in lieu of the financial gains,” the complaint says. 

He alleged any attempts at recovering the money were met with death threats. 

“Gurinder Singh Dhillon has threatened the complainant through his lawyer Ferida Chopra that if he did not agree to the demands of Gurinder Singh Dhillon, he would be eliminated by persons from the Radha Soami Satsang,” the complaint said.

The Economic Offenses Wing of the Delhi Police summoned Singh Dhillon to court seeking explanation around funds transferred to his and his late wife's bank accounts following the accusations from Malvinder.  

Singh Dhillon and his family members were among 55 people eventually ordered by the Delhi High Court in 2019 to repay 6,000 crore rupees - or nearly NZD$1.3 billion - to the Singh brothers’ flagship holding company RHC Holding as part of a directive to third parties to compensate Daiichi, which alleged non-disclosure of crucial information during the 2008 sale. 

Asked how RSSB might reconcile these allegations, which have not resulted in any charges against Singh Dhillon, with its principles, Baruch ter Wal says the group doesn’t feel it needs to respond. 

US-based author Brian Hines was a member of RSSB for 35 years. Since leaving in 2002 he has become an outspoken critic, particularly about what he sees as hypocrisy within the leadership. 

He describes RSSB as “stranger than your usual religion”, drawing on a study by American psychiatrist and former Harvard Medical School teacher Robert Jay Lifton to make his point. Namely, that the outfit fits the bill for the three criteria Lifton defines as making a cult: a charismatic leader followers must not question; ‘thought reform’ or indoctrination; and exploitation of members. 

“Followers of RSSB believe their leader is a living god. He’s considered an infallible being and his commands are to be carried out without question.”

Doubts about teachings are heavily discouraged and followers are told the human mind is considered to be “the agent of a negative power”, he says.

Hines also says devotees are expected to commit vast amounts of time, energy and money - though this is not enforced - to the organisation, which operates strictly as a top-down hierarchy. 

Ter Wal says members are not encouraged to donate, and while they are made aware of opportunities to volunteer, that too is optional. He also says the nature of RSSB’s way of life can lead to retrospective negativity.

“The lifestyle is quite rigorous, so if you become disillusioned, you could look back at 10 years and go ‘Oh shit, I wasted 10 years of my life, I could have been out there earning money and watching Andrew Tate videos’. And so you could get resentful about that, and feel like ‘I was brainwashed’ so the teachings are the teachings and if you fall out of love with them then you could say it was groupthink ... which comes with the territory.” 

Comments

[Choden]

Speaking of Gurinder, it was reported in Satsang last Sunday that during his recent trip to Petaluma he was so weak he could barely ascend the few steps up to the dais. Whatever his condition is he's undoubtedly in very poor health, so don't be misled by recent videos where he seems to be just fine.

Since we know that Gurinder does have diabetes, it's fair to say that he's a victim of the vegetarian diet that the RS teachings insist is perfectly healthy for everyone. But the vegetarian diet is not healthy for everyone. Quite the contrary in fact.

Diabetes is exploding across Asia, and very much so in largely vegetarian India. The vegetarian diet is to blame for diabetes and for other conditions that afflict Sant Mat gurus.

One condition being urinary/prostate issues -- Kirpal Singh was plagued by this ailment, and this is a condition caused by a vegetarian diet.

Since this forum is so boldly committed to truth about what's wrong with Sant Mat, I wonder why the topic of RS's insistence on an unhealthy diet has never been explored.

There is in fact a solution to the health problems that have afflicted RS gurus -- a low-carb diet that avoids grains and beans and has ample amounts of animal fat.

One former vegetarian recently reported:

"I went keto-vore 11/21. I've had an enlarged prostate for over 10 years. Urinary issues came and went, but 2021 was seeing more of this problem. My health insurance changed for the better, which is great when you are a senior citizen. I decided that my hemheroids, that I've had since my 20's, had to go. The surgeon wanted to see what he was in for, inspected thoroughly. In a surprised voice, he said, "your prostate is normal!" This was only 4 months after my diet changed. I then noticed all of my urinary issues have vanished. Wooo!"

Kirpal Singh apparently didn't know that his veg diet caused his terrible prostate problems.
Darshan Singh and Charan Singh apparently didn't know that veg diet was a factor in the heart problems that caused them an early death at 68.
Rajinder Singh apparently doesn't know that his obesity is caused by his diet of carbs and vegetable oil.
Jagat Singh, veg for life, was plagued by ill health and died at 67.

The only RS guru to live a long life was Sawan, who developed dementia, which is largely caused by the sugar-rich veg diet.

In short, the biggest problem with the RS cult (if you would label it such) is its irrational insistence on avoiding the ancestral diet of healthy humans. Vegetarianism is unnatural and unhealthy, contrary to 4 million years of our evolutionary history, and yet even most ex-RSers practice bhajan when this topic arises. (Did you get the joke? Bhajan, thumbs covering ears?)

Anyway, we have free will. Some will feast on calumny while they continue to stick a hose up their junk, seeing that as preferable to eating a steak.

[Appreciative Reader]

Haha, nice. Him quoting you there, I mean to say, very cool. Cheers!

-----

Small quibble, though, if I may. If you've truly said, "(RSSB) is stranger than other religions", and if that's not a misquote, then I'm afraid I don't agree.

RSSB is fucking strange, utterly weird, and complete batshit crazy; but not one whit more so than, say, Christianity, or Islam, or Hinduism, or the later and weirder forms of Buddhism, or the smaller religions like Judaism and Sikhism and Shinto. And RSSB is relatively harmless, compared to many other religions.

And not to forget the completely crazy religions that make all of these, including RSSB, look sane: things like Scientology, and the cargo cults, for instance. (Not the Mormons, though. The Latter Day Saint Crazies are ...crazy, completely utterly crazy, but they appear so obviously crazy only because they're so outre, so "other". They too, like RSSB, are no *more* crazy than mainstream Christianity, or Islam, or Hinduism, or whatever, when you think about it.)

[Ranvir]

As you can see from the article, Gurinder singh dhillon is the true definition of a narsisst. He has an over inflated sense of self, a superiority complex and insatiable need to control others for his selfish needs and the needs of the RSSB empire. This is opposite to a true guru, who is someone that has humility, and treats others in a selfless way , who is honest, and be truly free from the heart. So, you must ask yourself if this man, is not a man of god, he must be the opposite and a man of kaal. He always says hes too sexy on stage, often known to womenise, especially since his wife who has conveniently been murdered (may be even sacrificed to save his face). He is so preoccupied with sex, that astrally he may even be a sexual demon to exploit innocent satsangs, in this life and the after life rather than be a saviour of souls.

[Brian Hines]

Appreciative Reader, I recall that the context of me saying that RSSB is stranger than other religions related to the centrality of the guru being God in Human Form in the RSSB teachings. Sure, there are probably other minor religions with this concept being front and center, theologically.

But I said to the reporter that in Christianity, no one, not even the Pope, is viewed as standing in for God in a literal fashion. Same goes for Islam. Muhammad supposedly channelled the word of Allah. He wasn't the Son of Allah, or Allah in Human Form.

Sure, Jesus is considered to be the Son of God by Christians. But Jesus is dead and gone. The RSSB guru is alive and here. Imagine if Jesus was believed to have returned to earth and was accepting people as his disciples. This is the situation with the RSSB guru, currently Gurinder Singh Dhillon.

So that's why I said RSSB is stranger than other religions. It is very rare for a religion to teach that God has manifested in a human form and that person is leading the religion. But that's the case with RSSB. This can be viewed as either a marvelous story, great good news, by those who follow the religion, or it can be viewed as a massive scam capable of leading people seriously astray, by those who don't follow the religion.

How is it that the death threats purportedly made by the RSSB guru seem so credible?

One reason is that just as Donald Trump said that he could shoot somebody on the streets of New York City and wouldn't lose any supporters, it's even more true that Gurinder Singh Dhillon could order someone killed and there would be RSSB disciples willing to carry out that order, because the RSSB guru, like God, is seen as being perfect, not making mistakes.

[Appreciative Reader]

Two general housekeeping comments, if I may, Brian:

(1) Haha, looks like the blog-limbo-monster, that sometimes gobbles up our comments, has done the same with yours this time! That is, your name shows up in the Recent Comments list, but it's an empty link, and your comment itself doesn't actually show up.

(2) Over the last week or so, I've noticed that sometimes, when typing in your blog address, what comes up is an error message saying "Ormerod Meditation", or something like that, along with a weird string of numbers. Happened more than once, over the last week or three. What's that about, I was wondering. Someone trying to hack your website? (It's happened once in the past, I think. I remember you actually doing an article proper about it, sometime in the dim past.)
...Anyhoo, just a heads-up, in case Russian bots/hackers, or RSSB bots/hackers, or whoever it might be, are out to damage your site!

[Dungeness]

@ Brian Ji[ [ “Followers of RSSB believe their leader is a living god. He’s considered an infallible being and his commands are to be carried out without question.”]

Ah, if India's EOW ever lays malfeasance charges, the disciple
(or even his guru) can plea "I was only following orders. You
should really go after Mr. Big. Me... I listened to Him every day
but could never meditate at all. That's why I heard voices telling
me I'd be helping make RSSB great again, I 'spose". I swear it
was His voice though. Finally, I carry out an order and am being
punished. Still, you were right: Life is Fair. I just wasn't listening
closely enough.

[Appreciative Reader]

Ah no, scratch that former, the #1 in my previous comment. Just as I post this comment of mine, yours pops up on my screen as well.

Not to beat this to death, as this is simply a very minor difference in opinion over basically a nit --- like arguing over whether someone who hallucinates seeing Napolean's army marching by his house is crazier or not crazier than another loon that sees the ancient Chinese terracotta army marching by his house! --- but still:

I don't see any difference, truth to tell. The central premise of Christianity is God-hood of Christ. (Or at least, in Catholocisim Jesus actually equals God. Other denominations see Jesus only as Daddy's Favorite/Only Son, not Daddy himself, but whatever, potatoes, potaytoes.)

And does it matter, really, whether the big kahuna guy in some religion is seen as God directly, or merely the prophet of God, or merely the representative of God? GSD claiming divine mandate (or at least, having divine mandate projected on to him by the sheeple) is hardly any different than the same being done to Moses, or to Mohammed, or to the Sikh Gurus, or for that matter the Pope. If the Pope commands less fanatical obedience today than in earlier times, then that is merely because people have stopped taking him more seriously, not because of any admission of fallibility or admission that infallibility was bullshit to begin with.

Agreed, what you said about Trump. His followers are utterly, completely brainwashed. It's like those grammatically challenged Nigerian prince emails --- I've read a theory put forward somewhere, don't know if it is true, that those emails are deliberately made out to read like a semi-literate's gibberings, in order to act as a filter: if someone doesn't directly see that bilge for the complete fraud it obviously is, then they're probably stupid enough to be taken in by the rest of their scheme. They don't want people with half a brain to even write back to them; they're happy to attend to only the brain-dead folks. Likewise Trump: those who don't directly see his transparent charlatanry for what it is, will probably swallow any further BS he throws their way.

But, to tie this back to what you were saying, while that applies to GSD, clearly --- as evidenced by so many of his followers not seeing through his now-transparent dishonesty and greed --- but the same can be said for those televangelist scum, as well as the Mullahs and Ulemas and what-have-yous, and the religious leaders of practically any and every description. Whether the followers see the guy standing or sitting on the podium or the TV screen as God literally, or a Prophet, or merely a spokesperson, that's probably just a detail, and doesn't really matter as far as how high he can make them jump when we lifts his finger.

And then there's the fact that all of these other religions --- Christianity, Islam, Judaism, even Hinduism, and even, to an extent, Buddhism --- have a history of violence. Not so RSSB, at least so far. The only actual violence I've seen associated with RSSB is the manhandling that our Osho Robbins was subjected to. Which was insupportable, absolutely, entirely completely indefensible; but hardly compares with the literally murderous enormity that Christianity and Islam and Judaism, and to an extent Hinduism and Buddhism, have committed in the past and/or continue to commit today. (The only other religion that I can think of offhand, that hasn't gone out killing people in the name of God, is Jainism, I think. None other, not one other. At least not that I can think of offhand.)

Me, I don't see RSSB as standing out as some super-crazy cult, when seen against the background of the craziness of Christianity, and Islam, and Hinduism, et cetera. A few cults do stand out, like Scientology for instance, but not RSSB --- and in any case that is a subjective statement, and I guess Scientologists might perhaps put up a decent argument claiming that while they're crazy they're no more crazy than, say, Christians.

Anyhoo. That's all of that just a very small point of disagreement there, while obviously agreeing with your larger argument, and all of the rest of what you say there.

[Brian Hines]

Appreciative Reader, the error messages you've seen recently when trying to access this blog were caused by problems with Typepad, my blogging service. I contacted them and they said that, hopefully, the problem has been resolved. There's also some scheduled maintenance happening in October, but Typepad told me the problem wasn't related to that.

Regarding the comparative strangeness of RSSB, I guess "strange" is in the eye of the beholder. Each of us has a different relationship with religions. Each of us has a different perspective on the world's religions. What seems strange to one person will seem perfectly normal to another person. This applies in politics also. What Trump says will seem strange to someone who doesn't agree with his worldview, while it will seem fine to someone who does.

As I said, my comment about RSSB being especially strange related to it being an outlier when it comes to religions, since few religions, and no major religions, claim that the living head of the religion is a divine being, God in Human Form. You veered off a bit in your comments to talking about religions going to war or being warlike, which I never addressed in my interview with the reporter. You also talked about religions being "crazy," which also isn't a word I used in the interview.

I do want to point out that the New Zealand story mentioned death threats issued against people critical of the RSSB guru. To my mind that's an act of violence. I'd also include forms of non-physical "violence" of sorts, such as when the guru, Gurinder Singh, ignored a woman's tale of child abuse being committed by her husband, and mocked another woman's suicidal inclinations. See:

https://hinessight.blogs.com/church_of_the_churchless/2019/04/why-a-guru-shouldnt-give-mental-health-advice.html

https://hinessight.blogs.com/church_of_the_churchless/2019/03/being-worshipped-leads-guru-gurinder-singh-dhillon-to-behave-badly.html

https://hinessight.blogs.com/church_of_the_churchless/2019/04/i-just-made-this-comment-to-someone-who-tried-to-justify-the-guru-of-radha-soami-satsang-beas-unfeeling-response-toward-peopl.html

https://hinessight.blogs.com/church_of_the_churchless/2019/04/how-many-people-has-gurinder-singh-dhillon-indirectly-killed.html

[Choden]

Brian is miffed that no one agrees with his simplistic claim that "Gurinder Singh and his family stole a billion dollars and were ordered to pay it back." But the reason that we've seen no headlines echoing Brian's claim is that the court didn't (rats!) assign blame to the guru. Worth pointing out here that of all the people who were involved in this financial affair and were sent to jail, only one -- Malvinder -- said that Gurinder bore responsibility. Curiously, the other parties who were sent to jail didn't make that claim. Neither did the court after painstakingly going through alll the evidence.

If anyone here has several hours to spare and wants to see precisely what the Dehli court's conclusions were, they can find it on this link: https://main.sci.gov.in/supremecourt/2017/18187/18187_2017_1_1502_38465_Judgement_22-Sep-2022.pdf

Good luck finding something there that assigns guilt to the guru.

Sincerely,

Choden Wisely

President Emeritus of The Committee Against Beating Dead Horses

[Brian Hines]

Choden, good luck finding something in the Delhi court document that absolves the RSSB guru. This case is a long way from being settled. The court has ordered a forensic audit. So let's see what that turns up.

Since you're seemingly adept at finding legal documents, let's see if you can find any documents that refute the conclusions in these blog posts. Has the Delhi High Court reversed its ruling that the RSSB guru and his family repay a large sum of money to RHC Holding? I haven't seen any stories about this in the Indian financial press. So I look forward to the result of your legal research regarding the 2019 court ruling.

https://hinessight.blogs.com/church_of_the_churchless/2019/08/rssb-guru-appears-to-have-lied-about-his-financial-problems.html

https://hinessight.blogs.com/church_of_the_churchless/2019/06/rssb-guru-identified-as-beneficiary-of-fraudulent-funds.html

https://hinessight.blogs.com/church_of_the_churchless/2019/10/rssb-guru-and-his-family-ordered-to-repay-up-to-842-million-.html

[Trez]

This article just chips a little only away from the Disaster that Gurinder singh dhillion has become today

Pure and Utter Shambles

I know a couple of ex RS Cult members who left after finding out the real truth about Gurinder singh dhillion and his low life of thuggery and deceptiveness. How he in all of Punjabi is a well known bully who goes out of his way to get his selfish way at all costs

I was also told about the secretive 5 names given at initiation and how satsangis were not told the real meanings of the words and that they were of Kaal and nothing to do with God at all.
But to mislead the soul, and entrap it by kaals jurisdiction.

Malicious and Wickedness of the Lying Gurinder on behalf of his Master Kaal

It is also well known they said that Gurinder himself was just playing out a role given to him through family with benefits and he was clueless about gods teaching from day one. He would come out of his salary job as a waiter and become an millionaire so would all of his family.
It was all about the dollar, dhillion nobody's that dumb.

Punjab has become a well known drug ridden place thanks to the likes of Gurinder and his so called buddy's.
Thuggery and underhandedness has really paid off in Gurinders way to a life full of worldly riches, not Gods work is it.

Here's a despicable Indian Baba trying to fool his way through life to be only fooled as nobody's being fooled, foolish Gurinder singh dhillion

[Barbara]

Have tried to post a picture of Shabnam and Gurinder Singh Dhillon - the same picture is with the article below:

https://www.bhaskar.com/punjab/jalandhar/news/shabnam-wife-of-former-ranbaxy-promoters-mamie-and-dera-beas-chief-gurinder-singh-dhillons-london-126151220.html

A picture speaks a thousand words ... The Happy Couple NOT. The questionable timing of Shabnam's death. Her body was cremated. Will the truth ever come out?