New Delhi: Ranging from the benign to the bogus, magical to the mafia, fakers to the fakirs, and spiritual to the sleazy, godmen of all kinds exist in India.

Thousands of Indians put their trust in them but few can imagine that most revered godmen are common criminals who are instrumental for money-laundering rackets. The business of faith, which mushroomed across India like an epidemic in the past 10 years, has actually turned into a business of peddling false hopes. Yet as it is, gullible people continue to fall at these godmen's feet to seek divine solutions.

Today, there are a number of self-appointed godmen in India, usually found wearing a saffron robe with a string of rudraksh beads around their necks and sporting a long beard. At times, they can be seen carrying a T-shaped wooden staff to rest their arms on.

There is no dearth of such godmen — otherwise called "baba", "guru", "sant" or "swami" — in India, who claim to communicate directly with God and possess powers of forecasting events. But invariably, some of these godmen live a secret life — one which involves the dark world of free sex and an unimaginable amount of unaccounted for money, often stashed in ashrams (spiritual centres) or unknown destinations.

What is even more worrying is the fact that many such swamis or godmen enjoy the patronage of almost all political parties who try to use their clout to mould public opinion in their favour.

Enter the four-storey ashram of Chandraswami, the "spiritual advisor" of late Prime Minister Narasimha Rao. You can feel the security system monitoring your every movement through strategically installed video cameras, with Chandraswami himself keeping a tab on you from his private chamber.

Chandraswami sits on a pedestal in his baroque marble-covered ashram in South Delhi, wearing a sparkling white dhoti, kurta and silk angavastram, with a large sandalwood tilak prominent on his forehead.

From ordinary to king

"Chandraswami was a small fry but his real fast metamorphosis from an ordinary ‘sanyasi' to king-maker was the result of his close friendship with late Prime Minister Narasimha Rao. But it was only during the Lakhubhai Pathak case that the Chandraswami-Rao alliance became public," Pandit R. K. Bhardwaj, a renowned tantric of India, said.

Bhardwaj has created a series on the brutal practices of tantra for a private TV channel — running for over five years — and hundreds of other documentaries on the subject.

Among Chandraswami's staunch devotees are Saudi businessman Adnan Khashoggi, billionaire Sultan of Brunei, actress Elizabeth Taylor, two African presidents and hundreds of Indian politicians and industrialists.

"Chandraswami boasts of his ability to read minds and cast spells. But his actual abilities are known to few. He exploits the gullibility of his high profile followers and manoeuvres them in a way that they don't ever realise that they have been duped," Arvind Guruji, a so-far untainted Gujarati Brahmin-turned Sufi religious leader, who runs a sprawling ashram in Kapashera, South-West Delhi, said.

The riveting tales of rapist godman Premananda, or the dalliances of Kanchipuram Devanathan within the temple premises have certainly not faded from the public's memory.

Pilot-turned-guru Pilot Baba — who previously even fought in the 1965 Indo-Pakistan war — is famous for performing underwater and underground samadhis, claiming to have done this 100 times over.

Devotees from all parts of the country come to seek special healing powers from him. .

Caught on camera

More recently, Swami Paramahamsa Nithyananda's amorous acts were captured on camera when a sting operation revealed the spiritual leader in an alleged sex scandal with a Tamil actress. Nithyananda, who claims to be a celibate, runs the Nithyananda Mission which is part of a world-wide movement for meditation and peace.

Similarly, Shiv Murat Dwivedi alias Ichchadhari sant swami Bhimanand Ji Maharaj Chitrakoot Wale, who was arrested in New Delhi recently, has been accused of using the guise of spirituality to lure young women into prostitution, from which he cashed millions.

The 39-year-old self-styled godman allegedly orchestrated a sex racket, running into millions of rupees, by involving air-hostesses, college students and housewives. Investigators say Dwivedi had built cave-like structures in a temple he built in South Delhi's Khanpur.

Starting small

Starting with a small Sai Baba temple in Badarpur, investigators believe he gradually started a flesh trade on the premises.

Dwivedi claimed to be a great devotee of Sai Baba and disguised himself as Ichchadhari Baba, who can turn into a serpent at will.

Likewise, another "saint" from Gujarat, Asaram Bapu, is believed to have a "hypnotic" personality which has "attracted" millions of devotees from all corners of the globe, transcending social barriers.

According to Jignesh Patel of Ahmedabad who was a disciple of Asaram, "in all my years as a sadhak (follower), close to 99 per cent of everyone I knew experienced a strong sense of inadequacy.

"Not only does Asaram and company play upon the natural human fear of death but they also entice poor people from Orissa, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and other backward areas by promising an inner spiritual journey and eventually making them rebel against their own families... " Such gullibility concerning godmen is a truly pan-Indian phenomenon. The Gujarat government recently admitted in the Assembly that Asaram Bapu's ashram has encroached upon 67,099 square metres of land in Ahmedabad. The collectorate is currently dealing with the issue.

For the record, there are about 225 ashrams and more than 1,500 Yoga Vedanta Seva Samitis (various committees) across the world run by Asaram Bapu and company.

"Actually that tells something about our society. We are so insecure because of the miserable situation of our life that we sometimes end up seeking reassurances of the charlatans," Mahant Nritya Gopal Das, president, Ram Janmabhoomi Trust, said. "At the same time, a few people exploiting the society in the garb of godmen do not represent the religious gurus of India rendering spiritual guidance to the masses," he said.

KEY FACTS: Fakirs and Fakers

Nemi Chand Jain, aka Chandraswami, the prodigal godman, is waiting for his return even though the controversies that surround him are innumerable.

The MC Jain Commission Report in 1998 dedicated an entire volume to his alleged involvement in late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi's assassination and an income-tax raid on his ashram reportedly uncovered original drafts of payments totalling $11 million to arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi.

"Chandraswami is definitely not holy. All he craves is indulgence from the rich and the gullible. Despite his spiritual air and claims of mystical powers, he is nothing more than a confident trickster craving cash and power," Avijit (name changed), serving as domestic help of Chandraswami in his ashram, says. "Before he was grounded, his foreign travel bill was over Rs10 million per month," he revealed.

Paramhamsa Nithyananda resigned on March 30 as head of his religious organisation after he became the focus of a police obscenity probe. Nithyananda has been under investigation since television stations aired video footage purportedly showing the 32-year-old fondling two unidentified women in bed. His Dhyanapeetam ashram has insisted the footage was fake, but in a video statement on its website, Nithyananda said he felt an obligation to step down as the ashram's spiritual leader. Nithyananda has a large following in southern India — where his ashram is based near the city of Bangalore — and has 26 other ashrams dotted around the world.

Shiv Murat Dwivedi who was arrested in February may have run one of India's most high-profile prostitution rackets, investigators say. Probe into the racket allegedly run by Dwivedi alias Ichchadhari Sant Swami Bhimanandji Ji Maharaj Chitrakoot Wale, 39, showed that he amassed more than Rs600 million in the last 10 years. Dwivedi had more than 100 girls, including air-hostesses, college students and housewives, working for him.

A complaint has been filed against Asaram Bapu and two others in December last year for allegedly attempting to murder a former follower of the religious guru in Ahmedabad. Meanwhile, the Gujarat government has admitted in the Assembly that Asaram Bapu's ashram has encroached upon 67,099 square metres of land in Ahmedabad.

Santosh Madhavan also know as Swami Amrit Chaitanya, against whom the Interpol had issued a notice for allegedly swindling about Rs4.5 million from a Keralite woman in the Gulf, was taken into custody near Cochin, Kerala, on May 18, 2008. He was sentenced for 16 years in prison to molesting two underage girls in May, 2009.

- With inputs from agencies

Do you think there are more frauds than real mystics in India? Why do you think swamis attract large followings? Do you think these rackets happen because it is economically viable for all involved?