Archaeological Gazette

Vol. 21.3, Bundle xii, 31 November 2012, Copenhagen, Denmark

“Bi-monthly weekly for those who dig deep”

Part 2: Dung Divine

-          Dr. M Sathya Prasad

Dung assumed prominence at a national level when the now older, yet still sprightly actress, Duhi Chaiwala, interviewed her beloved Godman Gasudev. This actress of yesteryears, whose skimpily clad gyrations around trees with bare-chested and hard-bodied studs called “Heros” invoked in the minds of young (and sometimes even older) men a tempest far removed from anything divine, has now chosen to embark on a spiritual sojourn. “You have to morph according to times to get noticed,” she quips, “What sold yesterday need not sell today and one has to constantly keep reinventing herself to get some media space and public attention”. One could clearly see that her make-up is working overtime these days in its gallant yet failed attempts to make her look young.

Duhi Chaiwala (C): So, the world knows you as a big mistake!

Godman Gasudev (G): No… No… Correct pronunciation. Mystique… I am a big mystique.

C: How did you settle on your turban and long beard?

G: Buggers make money in so many ways and even have Rolls Royce. I must give something different to my gullible followers, starting with my look. I just bought a BMW. You must desire everything.

C: …and hence this attire?

G: My think-tank first suggested that I wear a Scottish Kilt. It was quite uncomfortable for me since I had to always sit cross-legged, and people started commenting that I was reminding them of Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct. A few mischievous young rascals... got to pluck their prying eyes! So, I finally just settled for a turban and a long beard.

C: Your beard is weird but looks cute.

G: Cute! My foot! I funded NASA and they made a scientific study on my beard and found that it exactly weighs 125 grams – give or take a few hairs. Just imagine me carrying so much weight (NASA calls it payload) all the time on my chin – literally a jaw-dropping experience. It is so heavy that once I dozed off in the airport and my jaw was gravitationally pulled by the weight of my beard and I also started to drool. This bugger – a horrible reporter – published a picture of mine with the title, “Godman dribbles even in sleep – wonder what his desire is!” I had to move heaven and earth to counter it with a bull that I was in Nirvikalpa Samadhi and my drool was Amrit flowing directly from Indraloka. My fan following increased after this explanation and along with it my collection also multiplied and hence my new BMW. There is now a heavy demand for my slobber! It is more expensive than Ambergris. My salivation guarantees salvation!

C: Any interesting story about the turban?

G: Darn my turban. Once I was sweating like a pig, so much that my turban absorbed it all and weighed a ton. I had to keep smiling all the time and my beard was also itching. So, I had to scratch myself, all the while giving the impression that I was contemplating. It is not easy to call oneself a Godman!

C: So long as people believe in any cock and bull, it is easy to become a Godman.

G: Don’t speak loudly. I have a long way to go.

C: How far?

G: Well the highest level of spiritual achievement is when you start selling pickles and jams, and start patenting yogasanas, all the while driving around in Audi or Merc and jet-setting across the globe preaching simplicity. One set of rules for me and another set for the credulous.

C: Now, let me come straight to the point, “What is your take on dung?”

G: Dung! Let us get to the bare bottom of this issue.

C: You mean ‘rock-bottom’?

G: What did I just say? Bell-bottom?

C: No, you told ‘bare-bottom’

G: Oops! Slip of tongue. Got emotional. I meant we need to get to the rock bottom of the issue.

C: So, how do we get to the rock bottom of dung?

G: By first getting bare bottom… I mean… er… what I mean is, you have taken the bull by its horns by asking a very pertinent spiritual question Duhi. We are all food processors.

C: …meaning?

G: Remember when we were dining on the poolside of the seven-star hotel last week, discussing how to solve poverty and world hunger?

C: Yes, I do.

G: Remember I was enjoying my seven-course meal while you told me that you were farting?

C: Godman!!! I was not farting. I was “fasting”.

G: My apologies. Yes! Yes!! Sorry! Became emotional. Just a slip of my tongue. You were indeed fasting – weren’t you?

C: Of course, I just settled for three large fruit salads with ice cream, followed by slabs of Tiramisu and the Black Forest. I never touched a grain of rice that night! I take farting... darn… I mean, fasting seriously.

G: Recollect what you did first thing in the morning on waking up?

C: How could I forget Godman! My stomach had a Tsunami and I took one big dump in the loo.

G: Haah! Loo and behold! Sorry... I became emotional. Lo and Behold! Now we come to the point. Did you closely observe?

C: My dump??!! Sure! I pinched my nose and did take a hard look.

G: Now Duhi, here is where the great truth lies (what a punny, puny, paradox! Truth lies!!). When you ordered those ice-creams, how nice and colourful they looked! Did you ever realize that your dung is a derivative of those very same ice-creams? Living beings convert edible items to dung. The poor convert gruel to dung, while I transform my seven-course meal to dung. On that night your body worked overtime to transform the ice cream into dung! The input could vary, but the output remains the same. Even Cleopatra had to take a royal dump every now and then. That is why, while we have all kinds of chefs for a variety of mouth-watering, lip-smacking delicacies, we have just one single breed of stool-testing lab technicians – keep on testing stools – stool after stool after stool – stool school for sh*t testers – not too cool. Dung signifies oneness. When people realize this, all the world's problems would solve by themselves!

C: Fascinating! What a lesson for life and how easy you have made it Godman! What should your devotees do now?

G: Simple! Every morning after taking a dump, take a hard look at it, understand the oneness it signifies; look at it and pray. 

C: You mean, people should look at my dung and pray?

G: Not yours! Their own.

C: But two years ago, you did caution me that salvation is farting. I have been practicing salvation since then. I eat a lot of asafoetida and fart hing.

G: Duhi, you misheard me. I told you that salvation is a far thing and farting is not worth a farthing. You have wasted two precious years.

C: So, how do you start campaigns?

G: Easy Duhi! Just select some motherhood-and-apple-pie type of topics that no one cares a damn about. Start crying from rooftops, give television interviews, paste hideous posters all around, and create a scene. Mess up every vertical plastered surface with ugly posters of my face.

C: Give some examples, please…

G: There are numerous topics to campaign about. "Save the bacteria that convert milk to yogurt", "Don’t pollute the moon", "Protect the stars", "Rescue Andromeda", etc. The topics must sound grave, grand, and bombastic. I spam everywhere with the grave danger mankind is in, say, because Andromeda is inching towards the Milky Way and would collide in just a trillion years. I give interviews on how mankind is oblivious to this grave danger. I thunder that the common man is unwise and unconcerned about the collision of galaxies. I lament that something must be done about this danger here and now. I voice concern for the fate of the people trillions of years from now. I create imaginary strawmen and beat them to a pulp during interviews. I use jokes, intonations, etc., and create a smoke and mirror scene! People simply listen to anything and everything. They are too bored and crave entertainment and fantasies all the time. People seek a constant dopamine rush. Exploit it! Simple!! No one would have a clue of what the hell they are campaigning about, but everyone would support my campaign. I whip up a frenzy about nothing and exploit the morons. There are people out there to believe anything. I tell them that the moon is the soul's first stop and people would start buying telescopes. You should know the weak spot of the masses. The moment you sensationalize things, the media would love you since they are also sick in mind and starved in substance. People believe in anything these days. They always want to be entertained and seek shortcuts for salvation. Even if I bullsh*t, still I could gather a sizable crowd, because I whip up a frenzy. Nobody would understand a sh*t of what I say and would nod their heads as if something grave is being transpired. Everyone wants to appear serious, smart, and intelligent! Crowds around a Godman have a self-regulating mechanism. Each one would compete to look more intelligent than the other and would readily look down upon the less serious-looking one. So, overall, managing these coy fools is easy. But the emperor stands stark naked.

C: Any other techniques?

G: I speak a grand language that makes no sense. For example, I thunder confidently, "The physical elements of nature at the quantum level are subatomic and so deeply ingrained in sublime luminosity, which when connected with cosmic consciousness effervesces immense spiritual energy levels at subconscious strata transmuting us to the fifth dimension," and legitimize it, "this is the precise definition of Om…" - I just made up this garbage - no one can challenge me since even if you spend a lifetime, it would make no sense. Leave the rest to people. They would give strange interpretations of garbage. They would automatically designate you as a deep thinker of the highest order and make some meaning out of nothing. For instance, people would take the above meaningless sentence, take a picture of my silhouette against the canvas of the cosmos, and use some queer font to make my words sound grand. It would keep on getting circulated around the world in social media like some incurable infection. Nobody would understand a word of it but circulating it would give them some profundity among their herd. I would be interviewed quoting fragments of the above garbage and thus would be prompted to produce more and more verbal faeces. People listening to me would maintain a constipated serious disposition since they want to convey to others around that they belong to the clan of some elite spiritual seekers. Deciphering my garbage would be considered the testimony of their highest levels of intelligence. Utter some nonsense and then suddenly add, "This is exactly what Heisenberg connotes in his uncertainty principle". Nobody can challenge you. Rope-in Schrodinger if you may or Schopenhauer. Despite this if someone questions you, keep a pained and annoyed face and insult him, "I am just a vector. It is up to you to travel. You must carry your baggage. I won't carry it for you." You must be a master of bull-sh*t. You could get away with almost anything. Once you dish out enough BS, it would attain a critical mass and start self-sustaining like uncontrolled nuclear fission. People would write books, derive meanings, write manuals, publish quotes from your bull, etc. People are desperate and hungry for solace. Exploit it!

C: Any interesting anecdotes?

G: I was once in Naples, about to deliver a speech on total body control. The crux was to explain that one could will his body to total subjugation. It was a big audience and as I was in the middle of my lecture, this tiny red ant somehow found his way into my T-shirt and started biting me all over! Oh, my goodness! It was half an hour of intense agony. This two-millimetre six-legged little rascal was wreaking havoc all over my back and here I was talking about total body control! I was desperately trying to hunt down the ant who seemed to be ubiquitous, all over my T-shirt. I couldn’t help but frantically wiggle and squiggle right smack in the middle of my lecture. The audience thought it was yogic posturing and all of them earnestly started replicating my wiggles, squiggles, convulsions, and contortions. One lady, after the show, was emotionally choked - tears dangling in the corners of her eyes - "You surprised us today Godman with extra compassion! Those mind-control exercises were least expected and quite unorthodox, but effective. I am going to practice those every day!" - my wiggles and squiggles! People are so irrational at times! Well, most of the time. That is why we thrive.

C: Godman, how did you get the name Gasudev?

G: That is one long and interesting story Duhi. Last year I was in Chicago – a windy city. 

C: For a lecture?

G: You guessed it right. Brilliant! I was there to lecture about the mind-body connection.

C: Mind-body?

G: Yes. It is quite possible to control everything happening in the body through the mind. The activity of every single cell could be controlled by regulating the thoughts and raising the kundalini to sahasrara. Conserved vital force crystallizes as diamonds and shines on the crown of the head. This was the same diamond Aswathama had on his head and so do I. I can easily read others’ thoughts.

C: Just for the sake of viewers, Godman, has this been your personal experience?

G: (laughs loudly with his whole body shaking) Should I even state the obvious? My self-control started when I was just two years old! No part of my body functions on its own. I observe each cell of mine and punish the errant ones. I could levitate. I could hold my breath endlessly. I could go without food, feeding only on moonlight. Why! As we are speaking, I have stopped my own heartbeat to give it some rest. Just because my heart belongs to me, doesn’t mean it has to keep functioning without any rest!

C: Wow! Looks as though my heart is now going to stop beating!

G: So, this lady – my host – was a good cook and fed me with excellent baked beans, lentils with onions, potatoes, cabbages, and of course, loads of roasted garlic, at around 3 pm. I was hungry like hell. Wow! The food was so yummy! 

C: But Godman, you just told me that you could go without food and feed only on moonlight…!!! You had also spoken a few weeks ago about tamasic food.

G: Shhhh…don’t interrupt. Shut up and listen. So, that evening I was giving this lecture at 6 pm on mind-body control to a packed audience of about 200 in a small room. I was standing and speaking in fluent English through a microphone, some ten feet in front of the first row. Near me was a newly emigrated east-Asian woman who did not understand a word of English. She was a janitor, instructed by the caretaker to offer water to the occupants, adjust the mike, etc...

C: Ok…, and…?

G: Halfway through my speech, as the audience was getting enthralled on subtle aspects of mind control, my food which was just getting digested started bloating me and I started releasing long strings of gas - one by one. No amount of clenching helped! My goodness, each one was a silent killer, a toxic whopper. Within a few minutes, the whole room was stinking, and the audience started to wiggle. I gave a stern look at the janitor and cautioned the audience, “Don’t mind little inconveniences. This is perhaps a test for your mind control.” My ploy worked. The blame shifted to the poor janitor woman. Since she did not know any English, her protests in her native language were ineffective. She, however, understood two things clearly – one, I was the gasser, and two, I managed to convince the audience that she was the culprit. Luckily since she did not know an iota of English, it became easy for me to escape and make her a scapegoat. The poor woman was helpless. After an hour and one hundred farts, I concluded to an asphyxiated audience, “Forgive the woman. Perhaps she is here to give a live exam to check if you are all here in spirit. She has perhaps been sent to test you whether you follow my teachings or have simply come to enjoy an evening”. I gave them a piece of sympathetic parting advice, “I could see you all were squiggling. If a janitor’s gas could distract you so much, you all have a long way to go for spiritual progress. Thank her for bringing out your real nature.” So, everyone – one at a time – shook hands with the poor janitor, thanking her for passing gas. The poor lady had no clue as to what was going on! So, you see – not only did I shift the blame on the woman, but also convinced my audience that they were spiritually inept! I was proud of myself and gave myself the title, “Gasudev”.

C: So, “Gasu_ji”, tell me how you manage to produce so much gas?

G: (Sternly) Dhui. Listen. What you produce is gas. What I produce is Vayu because I am a Godman.

C: I see!

G: My Vayu is one of the most important panchabhootas. It forms the basic elements of the cosmos. NASA tried hard, but couldn’t decipher the ingredients of my gas and conceded that it was out of this world.

C: How do you pass on this grace?

G: Disgrace?

C: No… no... I mean “this grace”.

G: My method of passing grace is by passing gas.

C: Vayu?

G: Yes! Yes! Vayu. I pass a lot of Vayu. I eat raw peanuts. Try it sometimes. Produces tons of gas. Some are quite loud also. I pass Vayu to help my followers in Pranayama. Heart-of-heart, I call my method, “Art of Fart”. Just trademarked that name. Copyrights are mine.

C: That is so exciting Gasudev_ji. Please explain it to me. I can’t wait!

G: Pranayama has three parts: (1) poorakam (inhalation), (2) kumbakam (holding the breath), and (3) rechakam (exhalation). Kumbakam is the most difficult part and my followers easily become adept in retention of breath.

C: I am getting all excited and impatient. Reveal the secret to the world. A lot of us are waiting eagerly out there.

G: My process is simple and effective. I convene my devotees for pranayama classes and pass a lot of Vayu. I call it prana vaayu. My gas is Pranayama Vayu. But it stinks so much it is really prana sankatam. My followers would have to hold their breath for long durations to escape my stink and thus they become experts in kumbakam. I also hold the title, “Vayudev”. Vaayudev + Gasudev = my name. Put a jaggy outline on it! My devotees are juggins!

C: Why “Gasudev” and not simply “Gasdev”?

G: “Gasdev” sounds too abrupt. “Gasudev” sounds more musical like my gas. You should write my name “Gasudev” every day, 108 times on ruled sheets if you want salvation.

C: What is “Gasudev”?

G: You should rather ask, “Who are Gasudevs?”

C: OK.

G: Look, Gasudevs are phenomena across all religions, nationalities, castes, creeds, faith, etc. Every religion, every nation, everywhere you would find Gasudevs.

C: How would one identify Gasudevs?

G: We are religious suppositories and spiritual placebos

C: Could you please elaborate?

G: Duhi, everything in life could be explained by dung. Let us say, you are invited to a grand feast, what would you expect?

C: Loads of yummy, colourful food and finely dressed cacophonic people.

G: And after the banquet?

C: Lots of discussions about how great the food was and whom we met! At least for a few days, I would be talking about the banquet.

G: So, eating is celebratory.

C: True

G: But taking a big dump after all that eating is just too personal.

C: Absolutely

G: So, listen carefully. Eating is a collective and community phenomenon. Taking a dump thereafter is intensely personal; you just wouldn’t want to discuss with people how you took a dump. You can segregate food like Indian, Chinese, Mexican, etc. But you cannot segregate dump like Indian, Chinese, Mexican, etc. The dump is a dump. Dung is dung. Call dung by any name and it would remain dung. You cannot segregate it as Mexican dung, Chinese dung, etc. Religion is congregational and has varieties just like food. Spirituality is intensely personal and symbolizes oneness just like dung. You can’t take a dump without eating. Likewise, religion is supposed to lead to spirituality. Religion is a collective phenomenon for extroverts, intended to bind society. Spirituality is for introverts; supposed to liberate and make one abide in a state of blissful freedom with very few interdependencies and transactions with the external, material world.

C: You mean, you use religion as a vehicle for spirituality?

G: Exactly not! If we do so, we are doomed. Our business thrives by using religion to fragment society.

C: How do you enlighten your followers?

G: Enlighten! I don’t know what you are talking about! We Gasudevs simply entertain people. We help them pass the time by passing gas. Who cares about enlightenment? Enlightenment doesn’t sell; entertainment does.

C: What are the marks of a true Gasudev?

G: We Gasudevs’, by definition, do not allow people to become spiritual. We essentially build our own fiefdoms that don’t conform to the tenets of scriptures (in India, sanathana dharma as derived from the four Vedas). We are religious suppositories since we shove our own versions of religion up into peoples’ rectums. We dress queerly; drive expensive cars; live in mansions; sleep in well-furnished plush bed-rooms; do sleight-of-hand materialization of cheap objects; produce holy ash; hug; have many wives; take-up social causes; debate on television; volunteer to solve world problems; give interviews; yell that God is just descending; force beliefs foreign to India; heal people; offer management courses; rub shoulders with the high and mighty; hoard money; dance with once pretty and now pretty-outdated actresses like you; deliver lectures; offer weird versions of science; use strange jargons; entertain; charge heavy fee for ‘enlightenment’; promise to make animals talk; promise levitation, super consciousness, fifth dimension; promote interfaith; crack jokes; run institutions and academies; give ourselves titles; give titles to others; prey on the credulity of people; promise salvation for hard cash; give bunch of ordinary lectures in Chicago and make those look extraordinary; ask people to arise and awake - and yet smoke, eat meat and die young due to all kinds of ailment; shamelessly tell lies like having memorized encyclopaedia Britannica!, etc. Especially in India, we Gasudevs dilute the great Sanathana Dharma of this great nation. We don’t meditate, we promulgate. We don’t cogitate but regurgitate. We form our own brands of religion.

C: How do you control the gullible?

G: Simple. I deliver a bombastic speech and suddenly invoke a feeling of guilt, “How many times have you thought dirty!! Even today morning for instance!” and suddenly make severe eye contact with some randomly picked sucker and yell, “Do you think your thoughts are clean?” until the poor fellow cringes and everyone looks at him. Then look at someone else equally severely and proclaim, “Don’t think I don’t know what is going on in your mind. I know everything.” People would go down on their knees, fearful of my mind-reading abilities since everyone thinks something dirty sometimes or other. I think dirty most of the time. Then I sound patronizing, “But I am here to forgive and bring deliverance. I have been God sent to bear your burden. Don’t worry, your secrets are safe with me,” and enjoy the sight of everyone heaving a sigh of relief. Position some of my guys in the audience, call them on stage, and heal them! People are neurotic, and it is so easy to manipulate them. Very easy.

C: You are so unorthodox and have there been any threats from disgruntled elements?

G: Good question. Once I was lecturing in Coimbatore and a small pea-sized pebble fell near me, some five feet away. I perceived this as an attempt on my valuable life. I immediately demanded “Z” category security. Repeated replays of closed-circuit video recordings showed beyond doubt that it was a crow that dropped the stone. I pointed to the news channels that there were several unanswered questions and that the public needed to know the truth. In the first place, what business did the crow have in flying where I was lecturing? Secondly, why should the crow carry a pebble? Who trained it? There was no half-filled jug of water nearby and since it had rained, there is no reason for the crow to be thirsty. Was there a Pakistani angle to the whole incident? Some agency with vested interests is trying to injure me by making crows drop pebbles on me. Is this the kind of security being provided to an eminent Godman like me? The next day the very same crow pooped on my brand-new silk shirt. Investigation agencies dismissed my repeated appeals as trivial. However, I went to the media, took umbrage, and demanded that wherever I go should be made a no-crow-fly zone.

C: Very reasonable demands. In a nutshell, what is the secret of your success?

G: Simple – Prey with impunity on the insecurity of the credulous by peddling hope for hard cash, and glory of heaven for gold!

C: Any advice to young men out there?

G: Never pat a guy on the back when he is peeing – how much ever a good friend that he might be. Personal experience. Did this to a guy long ago and he cursed me and my ancestors up to the seventh generation.

C: Now, before we end this, please give me some advice for my own spiritual upliftment.

G: Ah! My dear Duhi, never go to bed at night after taking both laxatives and sleeping pills together; I had tried, and – missy – the results were quite messy! My blessings to you! May happiness flow in your life like diarrhea and may all your troubles get constipated.

C: Thanks Goddamn… Sorry… Godman.