Ravi Shankar’s Hankering for the Nobel Peace Price, Part 4
By “His Holiness Pujya Sri Sri Whistleblower Ji”
(Did you notice the suddenly appeared Pujya there?! easy, ha?!)
Are you new to this fascinating sequel on Ravi’s hankering for the Nobel Peace Price? Read part one, part two and part three here first!
Sri Sri’s & his followers’ wounded egos, in face of him not getting the NPP, in spite of them throwing all that money & resources at it, was behind utterance of such statements:
Its a privilege and blessing for the Nobel Peace commitee & the Peace Prize itself to be awarding it to Sri Sri and not the other way round.
What fun! So SriSri was trying to bless Nobel Peace committee!! You doubters out there thinking he was doing this to gain more fame, power & political influence, now you know better! Shame on you for even thinking those unholy thoughts!! Instead you should see how compassionate SriSri is, giving them a chance, year after year to award him the NPP, for their own good not his!.
Most people would have given up by now, but not our SriSri, his compassion & desire to help NP committee to have this honour & privilege truly shows his divine nature.
And because of the ignorance of Norway Nobel committee, the devotees & NCs (National coordinators) had to waste another year of their lives to get more nomination letters. But not to worry, the AOL NPPP team & Sri Sri had a good strategy for 2006 Award, sure to help them to win the prize.
What did we have to do? Easy, all we had to do was to say that it is about time that the Hindu community got NPP & who can possibly be more deserving than SriSri.
Now if you don’t believe me, read the official directive below:
Recommended points for inclusion or elaboration in nomination letters solicited for H.H. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and the Peace Agenda of the Hindu Spiritual Tradition
- The Nobel Peace Prize (NPP) has never been given to the Hindu community, but this is the most peaceful community.
- The Hindu community has been deprived of NPP although so peaceful throughout the world.
- There is a Hindu leader which is most respected and revered by all religious leaders and religious groups in India, this spiritually-diverse country: Sri Sri Ravi Shankar.
- He is in line with Ghandi, propagating peace and non-violence.
- Sri Sri Ravi Shankar has initiated social projects in the line of Mother Theresa and the Dalai Lama – only with a much larger reach.
- Sri Sri Ravi Shankar is working since 25 years to keep the peace in the society and communities.
- He has played a mayor role to solve the class-, cast- and religious-conflicts in India and elsewhere in the world.
- The NPP for Sri Sri Ravi Shankar would honour the Hindu culture of non-violence.
- Sri Sri Ravi Shankar would be the first Hindu Spiritual Leader to get the NPP.
- With the NPP for Sri Sri Ravi Shankar the Nobel Committee would also honour all the Hindu community.
This ,added to normal propaganda items, was going to be the winning formula!! By the way, did you notice the similarity of the above official directives & those of Francois Gautier’s article in Sep 05?
And for those of us who had any doubts and to boost the morals of the devotees (to make them work harder for NPP 2006, in spite of the disappointments of the previous year), the following item was leaked to indiatimes.
By the way, I wonder where the leak came from?!! Didn’t they tell us (see part1):
It is the standard policy of the Nobel Committee that nominators and nominees must not publish nor advertise their nominations.
So what happened? Did their enthusiasm get the better of them? Were they trying to encourage other VIPs to follow the suite? Did they forget their own directives?!
And we all know that SriSri has some puppet journalists in Times of India too!
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1369606.cms
Sri Sri nominated for Nobel Peace Prize
[ Thursday, January 12, 2006 05:19:43 pm PTI ]
WASHINGTON: US Congressman Joseph Crowley has nominated India’s Sri Sri Ravi Shankar for the Nobel Peace Prize saying that the godman had helped bring peace to thousands of people through his Art of Living Foundation.
“I had the opportunity to meet him last Congress when I was co-chair of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans.
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and the work of the Art of Living Foundation are an example of communal conflict resolution, nourishment of the soul and infinite possibilities of the human spirit which typifies the Nobel Peace Prize,” the New York lawmaker said in a statement.
According to Crowley, Shankar had brought peace to thousands worldwide, even to people in New York in the aftermath of the 9/11 terror attacks.
His message of compassion, inclusiveness, cooperation and peace of mind as the foundations of happiness and prosperity is a message that resonates with people from all corners of the world. He has said that the sign of success is freedom, a tendency to help and cooperate,” Crowley said.
“We need to ask ourselves: Do we see these values increasing in our society? Working together, we can see that these values increase in our community and across the globe,” the Congressman added.
What a shame that they had to rely on a US Congressman “leaked” nomination for publicity. No esteemed politician in India to write a nomination letter for SriSri??
Everyone in Srisri’s campaign team knew how important the secrecy aspect was & how serious it was to not let a word out about SriSri & his NPPP team working hard on securing nomination letters. But to be sure, SriSri’s Press office sent this note to AOL centres worldwide:
Dear All, All of us will be actively interacting with press for silver jubilee publicity. It is very likely for the press to raise the issue of Guruji’s nomination for nobel peace prize because of the widely published news of a US congressman nominating Him. Please let us be very clear that the Art of Living will not make any statement about NPP.The most that we can say in response to media query is that ” We have come to know that several people have nominated Him.” We dont have to make any other statement at all.
I don’t know about the Nobel Peace Prize , but if there was a “Nobel Cunning Prize“, I think Sri Sri would be the most deserving. Don’t you think so?!
Of course what was being portrayed publicly was totally different from what SriSri & his press office were privately urging AOL circles to do. The following was sent by Srisri’s secretary:
Dear All,This is reminder regarding the NPP.As you are all aware, we are fast approaching the NPP deadline of 1st February.1) Please hurry up the process of getting the nomination letters. The attachment will give you the guidelines regarding the NPP.2) Also please do send us a progress report on what has been done and how many letters we have received.
love
Jaina
Oh, what fun!
To cut a long story short, SriSri didn’t get NPP2006 either & we had to go through the whole thing again for 2007. Surely we were going to win NPP2007. Even US AOL president (our ever adorable Michael Fischman) was so sure of winning NPP2007 that he sent an email preparing US teachers/centres for the huge interest after the announcement from Oslo
September 17, 2007
Dear Teachers and Volunteers:
As you may know, Guruji has received multiple nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize for the last few years, and the media has put him on the short list as
one of the more likely candidates to win. The Nobel Peace Prize will be announced this year on Friday, Oct. 12, and we want to be prepared for increased interest and queries from the public, the media, and from people who have already taken the course. In addition to interest in the Art of Living Part 1 course, a Nobel Prize may spark renewed interest in attending satsang, taking a Part 2 course,or re-attending the Art of Living Course Part 1 with friends or family members. Be prepared for an increase in public interest in the Art of Living…
And some of you who were always a tad suspicious about SSRS’s sudden interest in supporting United Nation Millenium Campaign & his sudden interest in encouraging his members to plant trees & send in their photos, yes, you guessed it right, it was all for the sake of increasing his chances of winning NPP.
These were just some snippets coming out of his own Ashram special projects office
From: STAND UP AOL – UNMC [mailto:standupaolunmc@gmail.com] Sent: Thursday, 4 October 2007 1:49 a.m.Subject: Stand Up event at Bangalore Ashram
…..Amidst all the Stand Up events around the globe a Humungous Stand Up event is being organised at Bangalore Ashram in the Divine Presence of Poojya Gurudev and would be attended by the UNMC Asia Chief Mr. Minar Pimple & Live telecasted by BBC….. (subject to confirmation)
….This campaign is a unique chance for all of us at AOL to make entries anywhere and everywhere, taking a anti povert stance with UNMC, and having the benefit of replicating what other states and countries are heading for, through the mail exchanges…..and at a point when NPP is so close….let us just do it…:-)
Richa..
: Stand up Take Action 08 MGE <mgesuta08@gmail.com> Date: Mon, Aug 18, 2008 Subject: UNDER ONE ROOF…ALL THAT YOU NEEDED FOR MGESUTA08:-)
1. 100 Million Tree Plantation (16th July till 16th October 2008) and 100 Million People Standing Up (17th -19th October 2008), globally through ONE ORGANIZATION’S EFFORTS and INSPIRED by ONE INDIVIDUAL, will have everyone, all across the world giving serious attention to AOL as THE Organization to bring about sustainable changes in all sectors…whether it is human beings or issues challenging mankind.
2. Our making it work paves the path for Noble Peace Prize For Guruji…
So what was the result of all that huge effort to win a NPP for SriSri? Well he still, to this day, can’t say he is a Nobel Peace Prize winner, but his PR started using the Noble peace prize nominee, as a new title for him. Things like:
Nobel Peace Prize Nominee for 2006
2007 Nobel Peace Prize Nominee – Sri Sri Ravi Shanker
Sri Sri was a Nobel Peace Prize nominee in 2008, in recognition of his work in peacemaking and conflict resolution in such areas as Iraq, Kashmir, Sri Lanka and Cameroon.
(what non-sense, but that is subject for another post!!)
Dec 2008: a Noble Peace Prize nominee for two consecutive years.
And later on they started to refer to him as a three-time Nobel Peace Prize nominee. By the way, the maths doesn’t quite add up, how many times they have tried so far? How many times he got nominated? Where is the proof that he was nominated at all? Can someone check with Nobel Peace Committee or do we have to wait for 50 years to see the nomination lists?!! Is the reason they are so confident about SriSri being nominated three times is that they themselves drafted the nomination letters & got it signed by their bought politicians?
One thing we can be sure of, Sri Sri still hasn’t got a NPP & it wasn’t due to lack of trying on his part!!!!!!!!!!!!! So those of you out there who think this man has any magical power or can make any wish come true, wake up & see, he can’t even get his own wish come true!
Comments are closed.
Beyond The Art of Living 
Brilliant work Skywalker.
Wow God is desperate for a Nobel Peace Prize… LOL..
Atleast thats what RS poses himself to be Krishna, Jesus, Shiva etc etc and his devotees believe him to be God …
Now this sounds fun God running the rate race for NPP
HHPSS WB J
You are awesome. I tell my friends that this and KLIM blog has lot of articles but if they have time to read only a few articles, then they should read this NPP series because it convinces the reader of many things
– RS has no special powers
– RS is not enlightened (how desperate he was to get NPP by any means)
– AOL folks are kept busy in promoting AOL interests and not social projects
amazing.. really cool .. i loved it .. keep writing..!! cheers
Dear John,
Hi. Thanks for your feedback. It was very encouraging to read it, because that is exactly why I wrote about the Nobel Peace Prize Project (NPPP). It wasn’t so much about the NPPP itself, but to expose Ravi Shankar for the megalomaniac , narcissist charlatan he is. In fact I was planning to write a conclusion part on NPPP (I may still do) . NPPP was very revealing in all aspects, RS’ lust for power & fame, how he uses Media to achieve his goals & the inner dynamic of the organisation & how he uses his teachers & all organisation resources to win fame & glory & wealth for himself.
Same applies to nearly all AOL projects.
Perhaps we can get someone to nominate GOD(our heavenly father/mother) for the NPP? There must be some born-again christian US senator or rep that would take on that job. Makes just as much sense as continually nominaying ravi ravi.
Personally, I’d like to see Greg Mortensen (Three Cups of Tea) and others who take small donations and use them to help people who need the help and whose lives can be changed for small amounts of money be nominated for the NPP. Enough with the ego of ravi ravi and his family, both biological and spiritual.
If ravi ravi wants to convince us he is enlightened he would find a cave and crawl in it and meditate and forget the pursuit of cash. Wouldn’t that be refreshing and impressive?
Wow! This is Sri Sri exposed.
I’d love it if any of the Sri Sri devotees, who pitch in to argue against so many other articles, can pitch in their views on this article and the e-mail transcripts published and give their justifications.
In fact, it would be wonderful if you guys could inform the NPP committee of the mechanization by this organization to hoodwink them into awarding the prize to Sri Sri.
It’d be a serious disservice to the world if someone murky like Sri Sri is ratified by such a genuinely prestigious award.
Hi Smiling Monkey (what a lovely pen name),
Well, what can they say? The articles are based on their own AOL circulars, all top secret, but plenty copies of them all over the world in AOL centres & with AOL teachers & devotees.
They can’t even say these emails are fake, because most AOL teachers would have seen them at the time, not to mention devotees & even some ordinary members who were approached by AOL National Coordinators & teachers.
And I think we should give credit to NP committee for seeing through all the “made to order” nomination letters, last few years, without any help from us! RS/Francois G./AOL Lackeys even tried to emotionaly blackmail NP committee & accuse them of racism if they didn’t give NPPP to RS. The chances of RS ever getting NP is Zero! He can try as many times as he wants (more fun for us!). NP Committee are not stupid & next time they even have access to Klim & Skywalker’s blogs all on-line. All they have to do is to ask any ex-AOL teacher to pass these emails to them.
So in the meantime RS has to content himself to be called “NPP Nominee” & put his energy to buying more honorary degrees & declaration of SSRS days in US states or he can see which other country he can put his photo on a stamp & say the Govt. of that country honoured him! What a cheap Charlatan he is!
its uttery disgusting to read ur views on somebody u dont even know, i can only sympathize with u as i believe; u havent experienced grace or are in need of it. only one thing to u ” TRUTH NEED NOT BE REVEALED TRUTH REVEALS ITSELF”
This is a charge sheet on CHARLATAN Sri Sri (Shri Shri) RAVISHANKAR. This man has spoiled the idea of spiritualism and has upheld hysteria in the name of spirituality. There are some riddles of Sri Sri Ravishankar’s extra-spiritual activities. Most of the riddles are over and above the questions raised by Prabhu Chawla, the editor of the top Indian weekly India Today.
1. Ravishankar started AoL (Art of Living) as a spiritual movement. Why did he diversify to social leadership and ventured into education, hospitals, agriculture, reconstruction and many other things?
2. If he justifies his foray into education, social work and politics, then can he remain a Guru or Guruji? What kind of Guru is this who is attached to the same things with the same fervor and ambition as a non-Guru is? Isn’t a non-Guru better, who at least acknowledges and says, “Yes, I am attached”? If this is not attachment, then what should the inner driving force behind his entry in extra-spiritual domains be called as? Whatever he names that ambitious desire as, will that be different from “attachment”?
3. I have been to his campus called Ashram in Bangalore. His AoL is based on Bhakti Marg, the path of devotion to idol Gods. Why isn’t there a single temple in his ashram of even a single Hindu God or Goddess, when his path is Bhakti Marg-based? Even non-idol worshipping churches have Christ’s idols! Isn’t this a lame attempt to attract the intelligentsia by exhibiting a non-idol-based “scientific appearing” path? Then what about the Bhakti path that is actually taught by him? Can there be Bhakti Path sans idol worship? And he is not against idol worship as such. Then why no idol or temple inside AoL campus? Isn’t this a dichotomy of his preaching and his practice?
4. He doesn’t earn anything and he is not an industrialist. That means the charity he is doing is out of charity of others. Why should there be a free food for all in most hours of the day in his campus or Ashram? Is it to attract the masses with charity? What kind of charity is this which is not his own? If he is using others’ donations for the feasts to the educated upper echelons of the society (most of which, in Bangalore, are software engineers and their wives), then isn’t this an unjustifiable extravaganza (on others’ help) that has nothing to do with spirituality?
5. Why does a spiritual Guru color his hair black? If it is because of his chele-chapate (over-enthusiastic disciples), his disciples’ desire to see his hair black renders the Guru a failure. Why does he have to be in agreement with the thought of his disciples about his hair color? Is the hairstyle so to give the Jesus look?
6. His ashram has a shop named “Divine Shop”. Can a shop be divine just because it vends some so-called spiritual merchandise? Isn’t AoL itself a divine shop that sells spirituality for fee? If he can give free food to hundreds or thousands of non-course-taker elites each day, why can’t he give free spirituality? Why can’t he trade off food for spirituality? If he is not in a position to give spirituality, his prime business, without fee, why is he in the secondary business of giving free food to any visitor, mostly the elites of Bangalore, in the campus? Does he feel compelled to do the same as his rival Gurus (like Satya Sai Baba) are doing in their premises?
7. He had to be apologetic about the book on Islam. Doesn’t that reveal an untrustworthy Guru? Doesn’t that suggest a lack of coherence of thoughts? If he is apologetic, he was wrong. If he is wrong, then how can he teach and claim to be a Guru.
8. He convened a meeting of Hindu leaders in June 2008 for AIDS and Swami Agnivesh attended it. Why was it called ‘caucus’, a term that has never been used in this context in India? Wasn’t the usage of term ‘caucus’ to impress the media and America-returned software engineers of Bangalore who were talking of American presidential election caucuses at that time? Wasn’t that a blatantly unacceptable term, nevertheless?
9. It is the tendency of common man to say, “We should take what is good in him and leave bad”. Isn’t he taking an advantage of common man’s condoning ability?
10. There is a lot of spirituality merchandising going on in AoL. Isn’t this a merchandizing aimed at propagandizing AoL?
11. People who have low self-worth (divorcees, criminals, sociopaths, anti-social personality disorders, failures) are seen taking recourse to AoL. Is it to learn spirituality or to take a recluse in AoL to save themselves from the onslaught of society? Isn’t there an evaluation process as to who is coming for what? If this was for spirituality, it was OK; but what about those who hide in the fold of AoL to escape societal criticism? Is the Guru turning a blind eye to this for creating a mass base for his own career?
12. Why does a spiritual Guru have to start a marriage bureau? Does the Guru have a statistics of how many people are coming in AoL for getting married? Is the Guru giving these ‘Value-Added Services” to widen his base?
13. If the marriage bureau is for the disciples to marry among themselves, are his disciples so weak that they cannot get along well with non-AoL spouse? If he advocates such marriages for growth in spirituality, how many such couples have grown to become saints? Isn’t he denying “spiritual” spouse to a non-AoL bride or groom by this idea of intra-AoL marriages? Is spirituality taught by the Guru so effete that a disciple requires only an AoL spouse to practice it? Doesn’t this value-added matrimonial service emulate a similar service of Sri Ramchandra Mission?
14. If his disciples are so strong in art of living, why are so many getting separated and divorced? If the art is not contributing to even keeping the marriage, what exactly are they learning? Are they learning how to separate and not have remorse? Are they learning how not to suffer and how to chill in spite of separating?
15. In Gujjar issue, the Guru went to Rajasthan to solve a problem. Wasn’t that an attempt to make a foray into “peace politics” after “Hindu politics” with LK Advani? Didn’t he go there because of ease and acceptability in a BJP-run Indian state? Was or is that the only problem in India? What about naxalism in Bihar? The Guru wanted an extremely red hot problem to solve, and not a simmering one like naxalism. In actuality naxalism or child labor, like many others, are far more complex problem that requires mediation; but it is not amenable to getting resolved easily, there is no instant reward, and the Guru is not acceptable to non-BJP-run State politicians. Moreover, the Guru requires an absolute peace problem, not something related to communism as in naxalism. The Guru this year took up the issue of his sons of the soil i.e. Tamils in Lanka. He told Jayalalitha (Amma), but not to Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, that Lankan Tamils are in trouble and asked the Lankan government to give him an opportunity to broker peace so he could somehow get a Nobel. But the Sri Lankan Govt, having known this “sick man”, declined his offer. Isn’t this a longing for brokering peace, because there is no Nobel Prize for pure spiritualism? The Guru later demanded immigrant status to the Lankan Tamils who took refuge in Tamil Nadu. He has been consistently going away from his core specialty of spirituality to hunt for the Nobel through peace brokering. Why doesn’t he solve the problem of his own mind that is so passionate, runs incoherently and pines for Nobel or Magasaysay?
16. He will, in a year or two, five at maximum, get a Magasaysay for social leadership because of his work in extra-spiritual field. But the real question is, will the prize not accrue to Art of Social Work and be wrongly credited to Art of Living?
Shame on you .He deserves not only Nobel peace prize but much more
I visited the AOL premises in Saint-Mathieu-du-Parc, QC, Canada.
I was astonished to see the face of SPHH (Self-Proclaimed His Holiness) displayed about everywhere.
It remembered me 1974 when I visited Haiti. The Duvallier’s face was posted everywhere with the sentence ” Jean-Claude Duvallier, President for life of Haiti. ”
Simply brainwashing !!!