Gurinder Singh Dhillon is the current guru of Radha Soami Satsang Beas (RSSB), a spiritual organization headquartered in India that has a worldwide reach.
In this post I'm sharing 27,000 words worth of comments left on this blog by "Tara," a woman who had an up close and personal view of both Gurinder Singh (photo below) and the RSSB organization prior to her becoming disillusioned by what she saw, which led to her leaving the RSSB fold.
What you'll read below is an extensive sampling of the comments left by "Tara"from 2010 to 2014. I selected comments that struck me as being particularly interesting, either because they related to Gurinder Singh's financial dealings, RSSB goings-on, or Tara's personal doubts about the validity of the RSSB teachings.
I figured this would be an appropriate time to share Tara's comments, since tomorrow is Independence Day in the United States, and in many of her comments, Tara celebrated her newfound independence from religious dogmatism and hypocrisy.
Since Typepad, my blogging service, organizes searchable comments by date, with the most recent appearing first, for convenience this is how I've ordered Tara's comments. In other words, the comments Tara left in 2014 appear first, and those she left in 2010 appear last.
Click on the continuation link to read more than the first few comments. I had to insert that break because otherwise this very lengthy post would make it difficult to find my previous posts.
I realize that readers of this blog who aren't familiar with Radha Soami Satsang Beas will find much of what Tara talks about somewhat difficult to understand. Here's explanations of some of her abbreviations: GSD or GS means Gurinder Singh Dhillon, the RSSB guru; RS refers to Radha Soami, shorthand for either Radha Soami Satsang Beas (RSSB), or the Radha Soami philosophy.
What impressed me as I read through Tara’s comments is how intelligent, witty, and well-informed she is. And I rarely came across a typo, or even a poorly-worded sentence. She writes clearly, passionately, honestly. I regret that, most likely, I’ll never be able to meet her.
I've copied in the comments, which are separated by a dashed line, exactly as Tara wrote them — aside from a few instances when I noted a repeated word, such as "the the." I've added paragraph breaks to make the comments more readable, since Typepad eliminates paragraph breaks in the comment search feature that bloggers like me are able to make use of .
It's really remarkable how much time and effort Tara put into these comments. In one of her comments, she says that a therapist advised her to write about her deconversion from the Sant Mat philosophy espoused by RSSB, since, as Tara repeatedly notes, it was quite difficult for her to leave an organization that her family had been part of for four generations.
I applaud Tara for her courage to speak her mind in these comments, and to disclose what amounts to devastating criticisms of both Gurinder Singh Dhillon and the RSSB organization that he heads up.
Lastly, if you're not familiar with the Radha Soami Satsang Beas teachings, a blog post of mine about how Gurinder Singh has been altering them would help you better understand many of her comments: "Has Gurinder Singh revised Sant Mat to v. 3.0?"
Now, on to the comments from "Tara"…
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Avi, GSD [Gurinder Singh Dhillon] is constantly on the move and a private jet is always at his disposal. IMO, how does it really matter whether it is from Religare or whether it is a private charter from another aviation firm. The important thing to find out is whether these trips are billed to Beas.
Gurinder has become astoundingly wealthy over the last few years and I believe that he can afford his own private travel. In this day and age and in GSD's current position, it would be normal to want to save travel time as RSSB's operations are global. Cyclically, it would probably take two years if GSD keeps his Satsang schedule and visits each center. I don't really think private travel in such a big deal !
What concerns me more, is the entire shift in ethos, the making of a quasi-religion, Dera's profitability driven motives, the creation of unimaginable personal wealth through dubious means and the total absence of humanitarian initiatives. ( Sant Mat demystified ? )
Oh ! I remember Charan [Singh, the previous guru] sitting in the co-driver's seat of his ivory Fiat, wearing his Ray Ban aviators, arm resting on the window and the wind blowing through his beard. A cloud of dust left in the tracks of the car at the Beas river bank … through which a cacophony of voices would come alive, Seva interrupted.
Men and women would rush to catch a glimpse of him and he would oblige with a smile, hands folded, a " Radha Soami " … I think I'm still lost, somewhere, in these childhood moments, where I do believe that Charan's love for the Sangat, despite the loopholes in the philosophy, was genuinely present and felt by all.
I've been trying to get in touch with the Babani family ( Mr. Babani was Charan's secretary ) to find out what really went wrong after Charan passed. There was a dispute between Dera and Babani's kin. It had to do with a property that was willed to Dera, or so Dera says. By some accounts, Babani died an unhappy man. It will be interesting to hear what the Babani family members have to say.
It is futile to compare Charan's and Gurinder's expenditures or any similarities, including the Gurudom. Charan's followers, the old school, are either off the path, confused or are reluctantly on the fringes of ( RS ) Sant Mat … My own, rather hardcore RS family, is too proud to admit that it has all gone astray.
The love is gone, and with it, all traces of spirituality that the mission possessed. The fool from the old school thinks that Gurinder is carrying out Charan's will.
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Gaz, I live in India, but I go to the UK and US quite often. I've got extended family who is very close to Baba Ji [Gurinder Singh] and equally close to most people in his first circle. That is how I get to learn about ' the latest ' though it has now become tiring and boring. But, GSD's a great administrator, you got to hand him that.
Well, the mildly interesting thing is that even the government / government departments in India are weary of questioning holy men. Somewhere in their collective psyche they do not want to ' mess ' with Guru's. They come cracking down on innocent men and treat them like dirt, but even if they have a sack of mud on a Guru, you'll rarely see them do too much about it.
In the case of RSSB, their PR is slick with the bureaucracy, so no one can touch them. I think GSD in particular, has established a good equation with the red tape … just like is the case with the other corporate giants and power houses of the country. In that sense, I do not see the difference between RSSB's practices and the practices of other corporations, the only difference being that RSSB is seldom questioned and can get away with much more undemocratically, and leniently so … 🙂
Well, with regard to the video, it was factually correct, IMO. Forget Rampal, he's a weirdo, the same has been chronicled by the oldest Sikh families of the Punjab. I happen to know a very prominent Sikh historian and he told me the same. This information is archived, but some of it is so old that it doesn't seem to have a valid voice.
The Sikhs of course, bring their hot-bloodedness to the fore and start quoting the GGS [Guru Granth Sahib, the Sikh holy book] and that's a distraction from the real facts. Also, I don't think RS is ' ahead ' of Sikhism by any stretch of the imagination. Okay, I'm Sikh by birth, but I'm a fringe-Sikh and I'm all for criticism. ( I even pushed the head priest < granthi > of a gurudwara once, in full public view, for reasons that will make for a funny post, someday. )
It is just that I think that RS philosophy is more psychologically damaging than the dictates of other missions and religions. Of course, this is my personal opinion, I was a real bummer at meditation and I couldn't see the light. The question is, how many have ?
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