On the surface, Ramdev’s blissful demeanor is worlds away from Trump’s growls and sneers. But his namastes provide cover for a reactionary campaign to transform the country. When challenged on his evasions and slurs, Ramdev — like the White House’s current occupant — tends to respond by pointing a finger at “corrupt” figures in the secular elite. It seems to work. Last year an Indian judge banned a critical biography of Ramdev before it was released and then put a gag order on its author, barring her from even mentioning the book on social media. In a sense, Ramdev is more powerful than any prime minister. He may be a wholly new breed: a populist tycoon, protected from critics (and even, to some extent, from the law) by a vast following and a claim to holy purpose.

The center of Ramdev’s empire is in Haridwar, a small city on the Ganges near the foothills of the Himalayas, about a four-hour drive northeast of Delhi. It is a sacred place in Hindu legend, and thousands of pilgrims gather there by the riverbanks every day. Not far away is the town of Rishikesh, where the Beatles famously visited Maharashi Mahesh Yogi in the late 1960s. But Ramdev’s operation is a far cry from the ascetic ashrams of yesteryear. Patanjali’s main office complex looks like an airport, with an odd, pagodalike gate separating it from the rest of town. Inside, there are vast parking lots, a cavernous employee cafeteria, lawns and fountains. You might think you were in Silicon Valley if not for the jerseys reading “Dept. of Yoga Science” that the University of Patanjali students wear. I found myself staring at a statue of a bony, bearded sage seated in the lotus position: It was Patanjali, the company’s namesake, who some two millenniums ago is said to have compiled the verses that are the foundation of modern yoga practice.

Ramdev lives a few blocks away, behind another huge gate manned by armed guards. (After Modi’s election, his government granted Ramdev the second-highest level of state security while withdrawing it from some leaders of the rival Congress party.) The guards waved us through, and suddenly I found myself in a quiet enclave of lush gardens. The heat and dust of India seemed far away. We strolled along a brick path to a small bungalow, and there was Ramdev, seated on a beautifully carved wooden swing, laughing and chatting with a guest. He rose and greeted me with a hug. I was struck by his slight stature; his bushy black beard, gray at the fringes, seemed more substantial than his thin frame. He emanated a loose-jointed warmth, like someone who has just run a long distance. Apart from his thin saffron robes — one wrapped around his chest and one at the waist — he wore only padukas, the traditional platform wooden clogs with a metal post for the toes to grip.

“This is my basic and ultimate mission,” he said, speaking in strongly accented English. “I want a healthy, wealthy, prosperous and peaceful person, society, nation.” He looked into my eyes and touched my forearm as he spoke. The left side of his face was paralyzed by a childhood illness, and the resulting squint gives him a look of cockeyed intensity. “Health and happiness, without yoga you cannot achieve,” he went on. “Yoga is my basic work.” Ramdev practices and teaches yoga every day from 4 a.m. to 8 a.m., in a hangarlike auditorium with hundreds of students and TV cameras rolling, and then again (when he can) in the afternoon and evening from 5 until 7:30. In between, he told me, he oversees Patanjali and its associated trusts and charitable activities. He interspersed his earnest yoga talk with playful banter, tossing his head back in giddy fits of giggling. When I asked him if I could follow him around for a day or two, he seemed delighted. “Of course! You can stay with me,” he said, gesturing at the house behind us, where he sleeps on a pallet on the floor. “I’m not married. But don’t worry, I’m not homosexual!” He burst into raucous laughter and added, “I’m against homosexuality!” The laughter got even louder, and he added under his breath, “Just kidding.”

I was baffled for a moment, and then found myself marveling at his legerdemain. As a Hindu monk, Ramdev has repeatedly declared his disapproval of homosexuality, calling it “immoral and unnatural.” He says it can be cured by yoga. But he has the politician’s gift for charming his audience. In a single, East-meets-West moment, he had both deferred to tradition and hinted to me that he was a closet liberal. (He was also kidding about the offer to sleep on his floor, as it turned out.)

Ramdev’s informality and practical bent set him apart from most other gurus. Indian religious celebrities are known popularly as godmen, a word that suggests stardom but also adds a hint of derision. They are heirs to an ancient tradition of humble, loincloth-clad wisdom seekers, but opportunism seems to come with the territory as well. Some godmen have become immensely rich and built cults of personality that stretched around the globe. They tend to surround themselves with fawning followers, and many claim to perform miracles, like Sathya Sai Baba, who became notorious in the 1960s for conjuring Omega watches out of thin air. Ramdev is not the first one to gain influence in politics; in the 1970s Indira Gandhi often sought advice from her own yoga teacher, who became known as the “Rasputin of Delhi.” But Ramdev rarely clouds the air with talk about enlightenment and religion. “My yoga is very simple,” he told me. “No critical postures. No philosophy or ideology. All yoga practices are based on benefit. Instant benefit.”