From well before 1940, news of Sai Baba's supposed miracles spread. His movement reached a pivotal point at some time when the size and spread of his following was sufficient to attract persons who only knew him from others and remained at a distance. Soon the numbers were too large for most followers to have personal contact with him (i.e. such as in a group interview), so acceptance of his claims has to be based mostly on belief, based on hearsay and reports in the media etc. He has long taught that he appears in the dreams of people who are worthy (but not in those of any others than he decides!). So those who concentrate on him and pray to him intensely for help, healing or other boons sooner or later begin to dream of him. The large number of persons who have become affiliated in one way or another to Sathya Sai Baba are attached through bonds that are emotional, mental, social, financial and material. The number claimed by Sathya Sai Baba , however, and parroted by all who reckon themselves believers, are certainly inflated by anything up to the power of ten! (See 'exaggeration of numbers by Sathya Sai Baba ')

A sect with an alleged following of anything from 60 to 600 million who supposedly worship Sathya Sai Baba as a deity - with active branches in up to 184 countries of the world - is sufficient to classify it as a major personality cult. Though the numbers are certainly exaggerated by those with vested interests in promoting it, the lower estimated are widely reproduced in the media as being possible and - because of the vagueness as to who qualifies as 'a follower' - no one can definitively establish the facts of the matter.

The prevalence and predominance of any belief system - including the many-headed Sathya Sai Baba doctrine - is more dependent on its having attained critical mass than on the likelihood of their being in accordance with historical facts or other truths. As to what distinguishes the success of one belief system from the failure of another, there are obviously numerous factors at work. One factor that seems obvious is the achievement by a belief of a 'critical mass' of supporters. Once critical mass is reached, chain reaction starts, sometimes fast, sometimes slower. As soon as a belief is ramified by enough other beliefs and putative evidence to spread to a sufficient mass of people, it tends to spread further. Some beliefs are unable to make much ground, such as the flat-earth theory, say. Others, apparently equally misguided, become hugely widespread, such as the belief that extra-terrestrial beings have visited earth. One major poll in USA found up to 80% of the population believing that UFOs are inter-planetary vehicles!

The "cult" label and Sathya Sai Baba: The word "cult" often calls up associations to indoctrination and manipulation of followers, involving various forms or degrees of potential 'mind control' (sometimes called somewhat exaggeratedly called 'brain-washing') using strong group pressures along with social and financial entrapments. Self-programming, backed by 'teachings' which function as indoctrination and are used widely in propagandist conferences and media products, is a core feature of the Sathya Sai Baba movement. Often, cults are connected with public scandals over cult leaders' sex lives and murder involvements rather than religious worship. All these features are also inalienably involved in Sathya Sai Baba's case. Suicide is not uncommon at the Sai Baba ashrams (even one whole large family suicide), though definitely nothing like the extreme enforced mass suicides such as occurred in the infamous religious cults of David Koresh of Waco, Texas, or Jim Jones of Jamestown. Another feature of cults is that those who leave them or criticise them are treated not only as outcasts, but are often slandered in public, harassed and stalked on the Internet and even in our private lives. This is being done intensively against most of us who have rejected and dared to criticise Sathya Sai Baba.

The Sathya Sai Organization developed its cultist practices only gradually and, as it grew internationally, it was increasingly regulated from a central top-down administration which was insensitive to other cultures or independent voices. When a flood of allegations of criminality broke over Sathya Sai Baba with force from 1999 onwards, the centre instituted mucb stricter control over members (many having left), not least what was allowed in contact with non-followers and whice issues could and could not be discussed. As the movement suffers the on-going threat, it withdraws more into itself. Many allegations have been made of sexual improprieties by Sathya Sai Baba plus his and his collaborators' undeniable role in a major murder cover-up and his proven fraudulence in numerous of his 'materialization miracles'. Having as his devotees the lions' share of Indian establishment - including numerous Indian prime Ministers, Presidents, State Ministers and Governors, Supreme and High Court judges - he is protected from legal accountability. In short, some of the classic hallmarks of a clandestine cult are clearly seen.

The U.K. author Mick Brown visited Sathya Sai Baba's ashram at Prashanthi Nilayam and also met V.K. Narasimhan, then the editor of his monthly journal 'Sanathana Sarathi'. In his account of his visit he wrote of the "cult of personality around Sai Baba; the sense that what was being worshipped was not the Divine but the man who was said to be the embodiment of the Divine." (Brown, Mick, The Spiritual Tourist (A Personal Odyssey through the Outer Reaches of Belief), London, Bloomsbury, 1998 - paperback edition, 1999, p. 83. Subsequently, when the many allegations of sexual abuse by Sathya Sai Baba broke forth on the Internet after most prominent devotees at the time, David and Faye Bailey, were repeatedly made aware of these goings-on by students and parents of young men, Mick Brown researched for a long article in the Daily Telegraph (i.e. 'Divine Downfall') where he exposed much strong cultist behaviour by defenders of the swami.

The Sathya Sai Organization soon changed its outward behaviour quite radically, becoming more secretive and strictly exclusive of doubters. It carries out clandestine influence in its many and persistent attempts at manipulating the authorities of the world, not least through the direct intervention of Indian Prime Ministers and President (egs. pof recent Sai-devotee PMs are Dewe Gowda, P.V. Narasimha Rao, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, and Manmohan Singh). A central defender of Sai Baba is the former Supreme Court Justice Bhagwati, who is also a director of the very rich and powerful Sathya Sai Central Trust.

The strongly pro-Sai writer Rita Bruce, who Sai Baba encouraged to write gushing panegyrics of himself and his teachings, has tried to defend the Sathya Sai Organisation and movement against the charge that it is a cult. In fairness one must firstly point out that Bruce's defense was made before 2000, from when the Sathya Sai Organisation became the recipient of massive allegations concerning its figurehead's sexual abuses and involvement in murder cover-ups. However, nothing has changed, apparently, as she continues to defend her Lord and Master at private Sai meetings around the world. Since she is still propagandizing for Sai Baba in books and articles also in the public sphere - see excerpts from her autobiographical books and my comments: 'Rita Bruce on the Sathya Sai cult', it is only fair that I take issue with her statements. Though my wife and I were friends with the Bruces, they have rejected us and cannot expect to be spared critical scrutiny. Not least, she was a recipient of letters from Dr. John Hislop in 1982 as she spoek about to nme many years later, but she does not wish to make this fact known or admit that she knew the contents of them. This is a definitive cover-up and concealment of the truth on her part.

However, there is no sign that Rita Bruce is willing or psychologically capable of perceiving that she is herself a cultist propagator. In one of her panegyric hagiographies about Sathya Sai Baba, Vision of Sai II, Rita Bruce has a chapter entitled 'Why the Sai Organization is not a cult'. The text is reproduced in the left-hand column, while my comments are on the right.