Date: 04-17-04
By: Robert Priddy
Early in 1998, a report was published by Sai Towers 'Spiritual Impressions', as follows:-
Article as it appeared in Sai Towers' monthly magazine 'Spiritual Impressions' (March/April 1998, p. 37).
A photo of Sai Baba was pasted over the text in most of the edition. When steamed off, the underlying report was headed "Kodai Sessions" and stated what he said in a discourse at Kodaikanal, as follows:-
From the 14th of April, Tamil New Year's Day, Swami gave continual discourses. There was the absolutely stunning news (and so because it was from Swami) in the very first 15th of December 1998, Swami declared the axis of rotation of Earth shall shift.
In other discourses Swami mentioned the effects of the embalance; melting of glaciers at the poles, rising of water level on the planets surface, earthquakes.
Never before has Swami spoken so directly about a future event.I was told by an ashram source that, when SSB found out about the printed report, his officials hot-footed it to Sai Towers to make Mr. Padmanabhan withdraw the issue. The same source told me that the messenger from SSB informed Padmanabhan that what 'Swami' had said was specifically meant only for (the benefit of?) those who had heard it! However, it was also reported widely by interviewees that SSB had warned them not to fly at that period around December 15, 1998. The ashram was alive with this warning - told 'confidentially' - when I was there. However, before reprinting the issue, Padmanabhan evidently tried to save money by pasting over the offending paragraph. This was easily removed and the concealed text was read by many (I was sent this text as reproduced above). Of course, SSB must have come to realise that he had gone too far with his rumour mill and that the sheer falsity of this prediction would very soon become evident if he did not exercise damage limitation. In this case, the lie would become evident much too soon for comfort, even allowing for how most SSB devotees are so well-trained at quickly forgetting, rationalising or denying things that show up their guru's dishonesty, asathya and adharma.
However, the concluding claim in the above article, "Never before has Swami spoken so directly about a future event." is also entirely false. One of the most revealing boasts of Sai Baba was in a public discourse in July 1963, documented as follows:-
"Let me tell you one more thing: Nothing can impede or halt the work of this Avathaara... Formerly when the Govardhanagiri (mountain) was raised aloft by a little boy, the gopis and gopalas realised that Krishna was the Lord. Now, it is not one Govardhanagiri, a whole range will be lifted, you will see!" (Sathya Sai Speaks new ed. Vol. 3, p. 92) "I will have to forego the car and even the aeroplane when I move from place to place, for the crowds pressing around them will be too huge; I will have to move across the sky; yes, that too will happen, believe Me." (Sathya Sai Speaks Vol. II, p. 92)
According to David Jevons of the Ramala Centre, Glastonbury, writing in 2000, Sai Baba "has recently said that we will very soon witness this divine power manifesting in the world. I quote from a recent discourse:
'Many events are going to take place very soon. Many mega projects are going to come up. The time is not far off when people will see me at different places at the same time. I may be travelling in a car, but at the same time I shall be giving darshan at Sai Kulwant hall and at the same time I shall be speaking at the Hillview Stadium.'" (http://www.ramalacentre.com/newsletter09_00_01.htm)The famous 27 predictions involving global catastrophe, which were widely said by ashramites to have been made by SSB to a group of 18 students (some of whom were crying and fearful when they told their parents), were circulated for a decade or more without SSB having stopped the mill or refuted a single word. If he did not know about the anxiety created, then he lied about being omniscient. If he did know, then it was convenient for him... the anxiety to urge people to secure themselves places at the ashrams with donations etc. to be safe from the catastrophe. Only when the hysteria reached potentially damaging proportions (for his name and credibility) after his officials had repeatedly asked him to comment did SSB eventually deny the 27 predictions he had allegedly made. Why would he have made them to young students? One likely hypothesis is that it was one of his oft-reported ways of cowing them so they would fear to speak out about such matters as the constant genital molestations which are so widely reported, even confirmed and defended by a series of leading office-bearers in his Organisation. There are numerous documented examples of his acting so as to create fear in his officials, students and other followers.
The claims that the predictions actually came from SSB are reinforced by the fact of his other similar predictions in public, as noted above. These new 'warnings' also served to induce people to 'buy into' the ashrams where they assume they will be under divine protection from any such dangers (but get no property rights or guarantees whatever in return). What the Prashanthi rumour mill propagated throughout the world can be viewed in full at http://www.saibaba-x.org.uk/enigma/Rum4.htm