The Pleasures of Gurudom I am reproducing below the unabridged contents of my letter which I emailed to my young friend from Connecticut, Shultz Goldman, whom I met and befriended during my last trip to his country. Shultz had written to me that he was curious to know about India and its gurus and godmen. I could not say no to this young and very curious American friend and wrote the following letter. Excuse me if you find the epistolary form a little irritating and the references to our epics and other mythological literature superfluous. These references were meant for the consumption of Shultz. I shall request you to please put up with this superfluity. My dear Shultz, I am flattered by the faith you have put in me by asking about the gurus and god men of my great country. (Great it is despite its gurus and god men.) India is a land of gurus and god men. Some British writers described it as a land of snakes and snake charmers. Gurus and godmen are also snake charmers. Though with a difference. The snakes they charm into obedience are Indians whom the gurus/godmen make fangless, meta- phorically, that is. It all starts like this. Somebody, not able to handle an emotionally crippling experience in life or some physical problem that has acquired threatening proportions and is not responding well to medication, stumbles upon a certain guru or godman. S/he is persuaded to believe – the poor soul has no option but to be persuaded – that the 'solution' lies with that guru. Such a person is comparable to someone drowning in the sea and lo! s/ he happens to see a raft and won't s/ he give her/ his all to catch that raft? Such a person is extremely vulnerable emotionally and intellectually. It is this kind of person that the guru is waiting for. Once such persons have been disabled by the upsetting experience in life which they cannot handle on their own, they gladly join the followers of a guru / godman and quickly lose their power to think. They are like tamed and caged animals that jump and run through rings and pick balls at the behest of the ring master. They have money, time and energy to spare which the gurus / godmen use to further their disciples' 'spiritual' ends. (It is another matter that the gurus and godmen have their own 'unspiritual ends' on their agenda which they further with their disciples' money, time and energy.)Y es dear, all that glitters is not gold. Also, now women have entered the fold to undo the gender imbalance but the representation of women as gurus and godwomen is woefully inadequate and many more aspiring types can and should get into this 188 Creative business. I would go to the extent of suggesting – what an unholy thought! – that our government introduces some order into this field by deciding upon some qualifications for this job and advertises the vacancies. A panel of selectors, consisting of old timers in the field known for their manipulative skills, should interview the candidates for the job of the godman/ godwoman. Our government may even consider honouring the most successful – that is, the most manipulative guru / godman or woman later on by instituting an award called: “The Most Manipulative Guru / Godman (read Godwoman, too) of the Decade.” In this letter from India I propose to uncover some of the tactics employed by these gurus / godmen to ply their trade. First things first. Dress is of utmost importance. God men don't wear stitched clothes. Perhaps they are harking back to the times when the loom had indeed been invented – otherwise how could you have cloth at all – but stitching was not known to man. Modernity and being contemporary may be a virtue in other fields, not in the world of gurudom. Here 'ancientness' confers a 'status' upon the guru. Hairstyle is of utmost importance. Keep your hair long. Don't ever go to a barber. Don't shave. Let your beard grow. Try to resemble the two-legged hairy ancestors of homo sapiens. Once I asked a lady who happens to be a keen follower of a