"India's Rasputin" - Dhirendra Brahmachari

How is Hum Log connected to Indira Gandhi? Read on to find out.

We come to the next interesting chapter of Janardhan Thakur’s All The Prime Minister’s Men, the book about how Indira Gandhi ruled during the Emergency. It was written the year after she fell from power, so it has all these stories from former cronies and assistants who didn’t yet have the fear of retribution.

In previous weeks, we’ve talked about the excesses of Sanjay Gandhi, and then about the “Goebbels of India” Vidyacharan Shukla, who was the Propaganda Minister during the Emergency. Those covered the tropes of the spoiled, stupid scion drunk on power, and the all-powerful minister who misused his position to coerce actresses into compromising with him.

Today, we’ll talk about Dhirendra Brahmachari.

Sharp features were in vogue back in the day

The Rasputin Trope

Dhirendra Brahmachari started as a yoga teacher who helped Nehru with some health issues. By the end of the Emergency, he was illegally stockpiling arms and ammunition, was caught leaving the country with bagfuls of cash, and was charged with smuggling a plane into India during the Emergency and not paying customs duties on it.

This is the Rasputin trope - a cult leader controlling an elected leader.

I’ve found myself questioning this trope. It’s a common trope used by the media to rile up sentiments. They use the word “Godman” a lot, often prefixed by “self-styled” to imply a lack of legitimacy. Mostly, it tries to play on the image of religious people having to be selfless, so if one is seen in the corridors of power, there must be something wrong.

Janardhan Thakur paints exactly such a picture with his introduction of Dhirendra Brahmachari.

He was the “Open Sesame” to Indira’s court. He was the surest passport to No. 1, Safdarjang Road, for saints and mendicants down to crooks and smugglers.

No metal detector every bothered his white Toyota, no clock ever bound his visits, no rule ever limited his powers. He was the Indian Tsarina’s Rasputin, the ruling mafia’s guru.

A bull of a man, oozing vigour, draped in spotless white muslin, as white as the two hairy Pomeranians frolicking around him. Come summer, come winter, that is the man’s only attire, a shimmering veil for his “body beautiful”. A mane of raven-black hair receding at the crown, a sinewy hand playing with smoothly combed beard. Eyes sharp and crafty.

Dhirendra Brahmachari, 50, has quite a physical presence, but one can see at first glance that he is neither a mystic nor a sadhu, much less a brahmachari (celibate). If anything, he has the look of a bhogi with much indulgences to his credit.

{….} “Ah Joe!” he addresses the man with the distorted face, “Why do you look so worried? I have engaged the best criminal lawyer in the city to fight the case. Don’t be upset, my boy.”

So, this was Joe Menzes, the co-accused of Dhirendra Brahmachari in a case of bigamy and seduction filed by the husband of Kusum Ahuja, the ashram’s prima donna! In his statement in the Metropolitan Magistrate’s court, the husband, VV Ahuja, had described the lurid details the “compromising situations” in which he had allegedly seen his wife and the Brahmachari.

That paints quite a vivid picture. How did this man come to wield such power?

A Foot In The Door

He had run away from his home in Darbhanga at age 13 and found himself a disciple of Maharishi Kartikeya, a yogi who lived in the Himalayas. In 1953, the Maharishi passed away, supposedly at age 350. Then, he and Hari Bhakt Chaitanya, another disciple began teaching yoga in Jammu and then Calcutta. Subsequently they moved to Delhi and started a yoga center in Daryaganj. Very quickly, they amassed a following. Janardhan Thakur says of him,

The younger of the two, Dhirendra, had proved himself quite clever in worldly ways even in those days, and with his handsome physique, he had become quite a success with female disciples, of whom they had quite a few.

In 1958, Jawaharlal Nehru, the Prime Minister, had some health issues, and he asked the duo to teach him yoga, since everyone including his Labor Minister, Gulzarilal Nanda (who would become acting PM on Nehru’s death), highly recommended them to fix any health issue with yoga.

By 1959, they organized a big yoga demo in a Delhi stadium to mark the establishment of their Yoga ashram. This ashram was inaugurated by Nehru, and was attended by many, including Jayaprakash Narayan (who would go on to become a bitter critic of Indira Gandhi), and Jayaprakash Narayan even wrote a foreword for a book on yoga written by Dhirendra Brahmachari and Haribhakt Chaitanya.

And right at that event, the Minister of Health sanctioned an annual grant of Rs. 20,000 for the Ashram. And they were even granted a bungalow for the Ashram on Jantar Mantar Road, despite objections from bureaucrats in the Housing ministry. Somehow, their objection notes “vanished” from the file, and the house was allotted to them.

Clearly, there was political patronage at play here. It possibly wasn’t just Nehru, though as we’ll see soon, none of this would have happened without his assent. The duo was also teaching yoga to Morarji Desai, Dr. Rajendra Prasad, the first President of India, and even Babu Jagjivan Ram.

But there was another twist that elevated the level of the grift to a new level.

Indira Does A Yoko

Indira Gandhi, seeing all the older politicians around her learning yoga, wanted to learn too. She began learning from Dhirendra Brahmachari.

Within a few months, Haribhakt Chaitanya found was no longer welcome in Teen Murti Bhavan (Nehru’s house). And he caught Dhirendra fudging the Ashram’s accounts with false vouchers and bills. When Haribhakt objected, he was told to mind his own business. Eventually, Dhirendra asked Haribhakt to cooperate or leave, and Haribhakt left.

Haribhakt wasn’t happy with how Dhirendra was behaving in the Prime Minister’s house as well, and had noticed others complaining too. He wrote to Indira Gandhi saying Dhirendra was creating a foul atmosphere in the Prime Minister’s house. He met Nehru in person and complained about Dhirendra. Nehru wouldn’t listen to a word against Dhirendra.

Finally, Haribhakt went to Morarji Desai, then the Finance Minister, and got the grant to the Ashram stopped. But soon after, Morarji Desai received a call from Indira Gandhi who requested he resume the grant. She even said she was willing to stand guarantee for the amount and it would be her responsibility if anything went wrong.

This seems to me the kind of problem that comes from the Nehru-Gandhi family running the government like a personal fiefdom. There are no processes or adherence to them, favors are handed out to friends and family, and are stopped based on more whims. Haribhakt was obviously fine with this when he was part of the Ashram getting grants despite bureaucrats’ objections, but he’s annoyed now that he’s been cut out.

But why, indeed, did Dhirendra Brahmachari have such a grip on Nehru and Indira already? Could it be that Nehru felt he was all that came between him and death? Had Indira told him things in confidence that he held over her?

Whatever be the case, at this point he was emboldened. Hesat around the Prime Minister’s house for hours daily, seeking money for his Ashram from those visiting Nehru.

When Nehru died in 1964, it was a big blow to Dhirendra Brahmachari. Though the next Prime Minister, Lal Bahadur Shastri had also learned yoga from him, Shastri was a different kind of person.

He made it clear Dhirendra Brahmachari wasn’t welcome in the Prime Minister’s house, started an inquiry into his corruption, evicted him from the house on Jantar Mantar road, and canceled all government grants to him.

So obviously, it wasn’t hard to get rid of him, and he wasn’t some nefarious, dangerous Rasputin sort who charmed everyone and gained power over them. Which makes it even more curious why Indira Gandhi was so personally attached to him.

The Return of the Brahmachari

After Lal Bahadur Shastri’s assassination/heart attack, Indira Gandhi defanged the Syndicate and came to power in 1966. With her, Dhirendra Brahmachari came back as well. And how! Janardhan Thakur writes

Not only was he reimbursed all the money (about Rs. 29,000) he had paid as rent for the Defence Colony House, but he was also given 1.8 acres of land in a prestigious residential area of New Delhi at a throwaway price. While the market price in 1968-69 was Rs. 1000 per sq yard, it had been sold to him for less than Rs. 10 per sq yard.

There’s a reference to this in former Prime Minister IK Gujral’s autobiography Matters Of Discretion:

“When I was looking after Works and Housing Ministry in Mrs. Indira Gandhi’s cabinet, yoga guru Dhirendra Brahmchari put pressure on me to transfer a prime plot near Gole Dak Khana for his ashram. As I was not bowing to his pressures, one day he even called me and threatened me that if I did not act on his request, he would see to it that I am either dropped from the cabinet or demoted.”

He slowly got more and more involved in politics, campaigning for Indira Gandhi in her constituency Rae Bareli.

But there was one obstacle, Sanjay Gandhi. Janardhan Thakur writes:

After his return from England, the boy had had several fights with his mother over men in her court whom he detested, but eventually, they too had decided to live and let live. Gradually the boy found that the Swami was after all not really worthless. He was quite mod in his own way, loved the good things of life, had a bevy of beauties around him, had imported cars, and in due course, he was to acquire a flying beauty - a three-seater Maulle aircraft which had come as a gift from its American makers who were quite sold on this jet-set Swami who claimed he could initiate them into the secrets of a long and healthy life.

Oh my. How badly do you want to live longer that you give someone a free plane? But, let’s read on.

"Oh boy, what a Swami!” the two boys Rajiv and Sanjay, are said to have exclaimed when they learned about his new acquisition. No wonder it was brought into the country without any import duty.

It should be noted here that literally everything during this era had extremely high import duties. Well into the ‘80s, Indian software companies couldn’t import computers into the country which slowed our growth in this sector. So it makes my eyes bleed to read that a new plane didn’t need import duty paid.

Soon, the Swami and Sanjay and Maneka were all learning to fly the plane. What a great thrill!

If you have time, watch this interview of Maneka Gandhi in the early 2000s with Simi Garewal. She goes on and on about how Sanjay and she led such an austere married life together. She barely even bought a new saree and wasn’t allowed to take gifts from the public. Stuff like that. It’s been many years, but I wonder if anyone can confront her with the contents of this book. Let’s read some more purple prose.

“Flesh Comfort” and “Vice Den”

Dhirendra Brahmachari had much to offer the boy; their tastes were remarkably similar. Whenever they got bored with it all and wanted to “change the scene” as the hippies say, they would fly off to the Swami’s new retreat in Jammu and Kashmir.

Perched on a mountain ledge overlooking the beautiful Tawi river winding its way like a silver snake, the Tower Palace at Mantalai was an out-of-the-world pleasure dome. “Aparna Ashram” as Dhirendra Brahmachari had named it, was supposedly going to become the last word in yoga research. That was the Swami’s projected plan, as far as the public was concerned. But in reality, it had already turned into the last word in “flesh comfort”. This mythical honeymoon abode of Lord Shiva and Uma turned into a rendezvous of present-day pleasure-seekers. The building was soundproof, lavishly done up with imported furnishings, equipped with sauna baths and underground “meditation cells”, all soundproof and airconditioned. The place, teeming with electrical gadgets, had a “hotline” with Delhi and atop the tower was a siren! Heavily financed by the education ministry, the Swami’s marble dreamland had cost over Rs. 15 Lakhs.

And there was an airstrip that was given to him on special order by the Defence Ministry, for unrestricted use. Why?

Indian Air Force helicopters often carried the Swami and his VIP guests to the Ashram. His own Maulle aircraft would ferry his rich foreign disciples to Mantalai for an exotic experience. These foreigners could easily build a replica of the place in their own lands, but where would they find a vibrant human dynamo like their Indian host?

For those who didn’t have the time to go to Mantalai, the Wami had built a 16-room airconditioned retreat right in New Delhi. Called the Yoga International House, it had turned into a veritable “vice den” for the Swami’s exclusive clientele.

You know what would redeem this in my eyes? If it came out that this was an R&AW op to collect kompromat on fledgling American/European bureaucrats and politicians. But if that had been true, they’d be tom-tomming it from the rooftops, so I assume not.

The Swami’s association with Indira Gandhi brought him rich dividends. During 1969-70, his ashram got a government grant of Rs. 30,000. In 1970-71, the grant increased to Rs. 3,42,727. According to the last figures given by the Janata party government in June 1977, Dhirendra Brahmachari had received government grants of Rs. 43 lakhs since 1967.

But this was perhaps nothing as compared to the gains in other ways. As soon as it got around that he wielded great power in Indira’s court, all sorts of people began flocking to him. Politicians, businessmen, industrialists, smugglers, anybody who wanted to get anything done at the highest level went straight to the Brahmachari {…}. “Whether it was license or libido, commented a Delhi journal (India Today in June 1977), “contracts or cabinet changes, everything seemed to be solved by a single “blessing” from the yogi. {…}”.

And this interesting bit from Wikipedia that is sourced to the Illustrated Weekly of India, edited by Khushwant Singh:

The 1980s teleserials India Quiz and Hum Log (ran from July 1984 to 17 December 1985) were shot here. Brahmachari charged INR25,000 per shift for the use of ashram's TV studio facilities here for the shooting of Hum Log.

WHY?

The question remains. WHY? Even if you were boinking the 60-year-old woman in the PM’s chair, you probably were as scared of it getting out as she was. She could literally shoot you dead in Chandni Chowk and no one would protest. Even if she was in love with you, she wouldn’t lavish you with this level of riches constantly, especially if it involved “flesh comfort” and “vice dens” as Janardhan Thakur calls it.

Recent disclosures about his various ashrams and his activities would indicate that there was much more to it than that. Some years ago, this so-called yogi was caught emplaning at Palam with a pistol on his person and a bagful of money in his hand. Around 1971, the customs authorities at Palam airport were alerted by Santa Cruz, Bombay, that a Swami had taken off with some “contraband goods”. The Brahmachari was allegedly nabbed at the Palam airport, but soon afterwards, a functionary of the Prime Minister’s house rushed to the airport and got him released. {…}

Apart from being a well-greased pipeline between the Underworld and the powers-that-be, the Swami was suspected to have played a key role in the dispersal of “big booty”. According to some, he was the man who controlled the “war chest” on behalf of Indira Gandhi and Sanjay.

So okay, that would make sense if he was money-laundering on behalf of the Congress party so they could win elections harder. Possibly he was even laundering money personally for Indira Gandhi, maybe making connections abroad and stashing money in Swiss bank accounts. Though, I can’t seem to find any tell-tale trips to Switzerland in any references to him.

The Problem With The Nehru-Gandhis

The reason both Indira and Sanjay cultivated all these shady sorts, be they Vidyacharan Shukla or Dhirendra Brahmachari, was not out of any compulsion. They seem to have actively sought out people like this who were happy to operate in the gray, so that they could get their own dirty work done.

A lot of the discourse in Indian mainstream media would probably say Indira Gandhi was too superstitious which is why she surrounded herself with such people. But there are plenty of superstitious people who have a guru, including people in power. Most of them don’t let those gurus operate a den of vice or flout laws on an industrial scale to benefit them.

The problem here isn’t that “religion is getting mixed with politics” as some critics would say. The problem is the Prime Minister and her family are cultivating money launderers, womanizers, and those who use religion for nefarious purposes from scratch. It’s very unlikely that without Indira Gandhi’s patronage, this guy would have done much more than have a few extra hot yoga sessions.

One thing that people would say was that the Nehru-Gandhis felt entitled to the Prime Ministership of India. This could be true, but somehow, the vibe seems different from, say, the descendants of the rules of the Princely states. Take, for instance, Maharani Gayatri Devi of Jaipur, who became an MP, was well-regarded among her constituents, and who Indira Gandhi couldn’t stand and had thrown in prison during the Emergency. The Maharani did feel entitled to her title and role, but she also felt a deep sense of obligation and did whatever it took to help her people. That is missing for all the Nehru-Gandhis.

When I think about how they came to power, it reminds me heavily of the Zamindari system. The British took the most crooked stone-hearted criminals and made them Zamindar of a parcel of land. In exchange for land ownership rights, they had to levy taxes on the peasants and pay the British a fixed amount. This led to them squeezing the peasants, lots of short-term thinking on agriculture and land use, and entrenched social hierarchies that we’re still struggling to break. The zamindars had no connection to the land they were granted necessarily. They were appointed by the British and owed the British, not their tenants.

Looking at this system and reading about how it was established, it feels like the British just gave India as a Jagir to the Indian National Congress, who then proceeded to treat it as a family fiefdom. It didn’t matter how badly it was run as long as they got to fulfill their needs through it, no matter how expensive. Nehru’s needs were to seem intellectual and be respected among Western leaders, which he did. Indira, Sanjay, and Rajiv Gandhi seem to have had very different needs, though.

Indira Gandhi seemingly did care about coming across as strong, and she was deeply insecure. While she established R&AW and partitioned Pakistan, she also just gave away Katchatheevu so it wouldn’t be awkward with her friend Sirimavo Bandaranaike. Her interest seems to have been in fortifying the fiefdom and ensuring it passes to her children.

Sanjay Gandhi passed away in 1980, but his mantra seems to have just been to exploit and enjoy the country with his friends. Rajiv Gandhi seems to have wanted to do better, so it was like how you run a startup with your friends and family. It was totally on brand to use the flagship aircraft carrier of your Navy to party.

They were handed the leadership of the country. They probably always carried this insecurity that they didn’t earn it and could lose it at any given time. And that led to them squeezing it as dry as it could.

It isn’t sufficient to blindly hate dynasty politics. We need to go deep into understanding the causes of why it’s awful. We need to understand why these tropes about corrupt politicians and their spoiled scions are such a thing in the media and where they came from. Without this, we end up pointing to the wrong things and continue to enable this horrible type of politics.