DHFL Victims Encountering a Moneyless Sage
DHFL Victims Encountering a Moneyless Sage
DHFL Victims Encountering a Moneyless Sage
Posted on 8th March, 2025 (GMT 15:30 hrs)
This post is dedicated in honour of the three saints, eco-martyrs and eco-activists: Swami Nigamananda Saraswati, Sant Swami Gyan Swaroop Sanand, and Sant Gopaldas—who stood steadfast in their resolve while putting their lives at stake by fasting-unto-death for saving the river Ganga—we pledge to resist all forms of injustice with unwavering resolve. Their sacrifice is a call to action against ecological destruction, crony corporate exploitation and state apathy, reminding us that true struggle lies in fearless defiance. Let their spirits guide us as we fight for justice, the rights of our lands, forests and rivers, as well as ourselves.
ABSTRACT
This agit-prop “fiction” narrates an encounter between the authors, who are victims of the DHFL financial scam, and a reclusive sage in the Himalayan region near Joshimath, India. The authors describe their dismay at the environmental degradation caused by unplanned mega-projects like the Chardham initiative, which have led to significant ecological damage and increased landslides in the area. During their journey, they meet a naked sage and engage in a conversation about contemporary issues. The sage expresses disdain for commercialized religious figures and criticizes the current ruling party’s push for a Hindu Rashtra, labeling it as exclusivist and fascist. He emphasizes his belief in ‘Mānavagotra,’ viewing himself as part of a universal human identity beyond national, religious, caste, or class distinctions. When the authors share their plight as DHFL scam victims, the sage advises against seeking heroes or messiahs for salvation. Instead, he encourages them to take proactive, non-violent action to reclaim their rights, citing relevant verses from the Bhagavad Gītā that emphasize the importance of self-initiated action without attachment to outcomes, and also the attachment to passive inaction. The narrative intertwines themes of environmental conservation, criticism of religious commercialization, political dissent against crony establishment, and collective empowerment in the face of systemic financial injustices, with a focus on the DHFL “scam”.
[A few months back, when we were traveling to Joshimath in Northern India, we felt disheartened by witnessing the state of the geographical landscape, ravaged by the Chardham project initiated by the current ruling party of India. Massive land erosion leading to landslides resulted from unplanned mega-projects intended to bolster the “religious tourism” industry, recurrently endangering the ecological integrity of the area and leaving it a fragile spectacle on the brink of a “sinking” demise.
We were reminded of Sonam Wangchuk’s Ladakh Movement⤡ to restore the ecological entitlement of the environmentally and geo-politically vulnerable Himalayas…
While walking down the mountain slopes, we unexpectedly encountered a naked fakir, a sage, or a saint. We needed to rest and thus began discussing the sufferings of humankind with him as he seemed quite approachable.
So, we approached him without any hesitation and sat down. Consequently, we asked him the following:]
We: Why are you, a knowledgeable person, residing in this desolate place in isolation? How do you compare yourself with super-rich gurus like Radhanath Swami⤡ ⤡, Ramesh Bhaishri Oza⤡, Ramdev Baba or Sadhguru⤡?
Saint: Have you seen the movie “PK” or “OMG”? You might find “wrong number” gurus as depicted by an alien, PK? I don’t need to be that kind of corporate guru. They are perpetually playing with words and soliciting donations from their corporate disciples. I exist outside of that circle.
We: We’re pleased to know that you have distanced yourself from such sponsored agents of the religious business industry. Are you happy with the emergence of the Hindu Rastra at this time, supported by the current ruling party of India?
Saint: (angrily) Please, don’t! I stand firmly opposed to this exclusivist, discriminatory, parochial, jingoistic, fundamentalist, fascist version of Hinduism. The religion of humankind I follow teaches me to see myself as part of the transpersonal ideal of Mānavagotra, that is, to be a species-being without any externally imposed national, religious, caste, or class identity. I am an inhabitant of no-nation.
I oppose the current ruling party, as they blindly chase profits, assets, and party funds, showing no concern for the rights and aspirations of the people of India at large. I am against the establishment of religion as a shop or as a profitable company, hence I do not lend my support to the current ruling party’s statue-temple nationalism! They are foregrounding the religious hatred–it is indeed their mask.
On the other hand, these money-mongers are taking refuge in market fundamentalism in favor of the free flow of private capital, a space from which I have long ago withdrawn myself (pratyāhāra).
[Then, out of the blue, we inquired about our suffering as victims of the DHFL scam⤡ ⤡:]
We: We don’t know whether you are aware of the DHFL scam, one of the largest financial scandals in post-independent India. We are its victims, who suffered massive haircuits on our hard-earned money solely due to crony operations. We have endured this suffering for the last five years due to this manufactured financial abuse. What can we do? Can you help us? Can you be our saviour, the messiah?
[He chuckled and replied:]
Saint: Don’t look for heroes. Unhappy is the land that needs and breeds a hero. Yes, in fact I do know about this so-called “scam”. Let me ask you something: did you and your fellow victims initiate a non-violent civil disobedience movement against such systemic financial discrimination and abuse?
[Our answer was in the negative.]
We: No. We surely didn’t.
[He then went ahead to quote a popular śloka from the Bhagavad Gītā.]
Saint: Let me cite a popular śloka from the Bhagavad Gītā to make you understand the significance and necessity of acting for yourself to secure your infringed rights:
karmaṇyevādhikāraste mā phaleṣhu kadāchana
mā karma-phala-hetur bhūrmā te saṅgo ’stvakarmaṇi
This means: you have the right to work only, but never to its fruits. Let not the fruits of action be your motive of action, nor let your attachment be to inaction.
You might know the meaning of the first line and its various interpretations, but I want to emphasize the second line of this śloka for the time being.
Let’s break down the entire second line of the śloka, word by word:
Mā translates to No/Not
Karmaphala has two words, Karma+Phala; Karma means work and phala means result or fruit of the work.
Hetu here means “motive”
Bhu translates to be
Mā translates to No/Not
And now let us move on to the second part of the second line, which I am focusing on even more right now:
Te translates to Your
Sang translates to attachment
Astu translates to Let there be
Akarmaṇi translates to In inaction or Karmavirati
Let us refer to two other verses of the Gītā in this context:
karmaṇaiva hi sansiddhim āsthitā janakādayaḥ
loka-saṅgraham evāpi sampaśhyan kartum arhasi
yad yad ācharati śhreṣhṭhas tat tad evetaro janaḥ
sa yat pramāṇaṁ kurute lokas tad anuvartate
These are verses 3.20 and 3.21 from the Bhagavad Gītā uttered together.
It basically means:
By performing their prescribed duties, King Janaka, Aśvapati, and others attained perfection. You should also perform your duties to set an example for the good of the world. Whatever actions great persons perform, common people follow. Whatever standards they set, all the world pursues.
And again in 3.25, it is being said:
saktāḥ karmaṇyavidvānso yathā kurvanti bhārata
kuryād vidvāns tathāsaktaśh chikīrṣhur loka-saṅgraham
This means:
As ignorant people perform their duties with attachment to the results, O scion of Bharat, so should the wise act without attachment for the sake of leading people on the right path.
Look! Despite attaining Brahmajñāna (absolute knowledge of the ultimate reality), the two great saint kings, Janaka and Aśvapati, did not withdraw themselves from the path of karmayoga. If they committed to karmavirati (abstention from action/cessation of action/performing inaction) instead, their “other” subjects would follow their “exemplary model” of cessation of actions and thus go astray (utsanya). What do you do for your hard-earned money-signifier? Are you just waiting for the expensive legal verdict without doing anything for yourself, by yourself?
We: Oh my Wise Lord, please show us the path for such a non-violent civil disobedience movement!
Saint: I was one of the participants in the anti-mega dam projects like Tehri, Bhakra Nangal, Sardar Sarovar, and Farakka’s single purpose dam. We conducted physical movements with songs, plays, posters, placards, graffiti, and sit-in demonstrations. We performed Gurudev Tagore’s play “Muktadhara,” the Waterfall, in front of the Tehri Dam as an art and act of resistance.
Don’t you remember the example of Sant Swami Gyan Swaroop Sanand, who was previously known as G. D. Agrawal⤡ (when he was known as a civil and environmental engineer) before his initiation into monkhood? He became an eco-martyr in 2018 after fasting for 111 days to protect the Ganga river from various threats and the persistent governmental apathy. His earlier fast in 2009 even resulted in the halt of the damming of the Bhagirathi River! I must also not fail to mention Sant Gopaldas⤡, who also did a similar kind of follow-up hunger strike in the same year for a recorded number of 116+ days to save the Ganges, after which he went curiously “missing”. Even before these two persons, Swami Nigamananda Saraswati⤡ went on a hunger strike to protest illegal mining in the Ganges. He died on June 13, 2011, after 115 days of fasting. Learn from these glowing instances and replicate them in your action, rather than just sitting around idly in despair.
What is your government’s “Swachh Bharat” Abhiyan doing here? Does it care even a little bit about the state of the Ganga, Yamuna, and other rivers, with their rising BOD levels and associated factors of massive industrial and sewage pollution? Oh no, the government is busy promoting the Mahakumbh, which perpetuates the same kind of pollution at alarming levels, and also causes the termination of human lives through harsh stampedes! This point has been highlighted by none other than two central agencies, National Green Tribunal (NGT) and the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB).
What do your Hindutva-supporters think here? This extremely polluted water is ambrosia? Sad how blind dogmatic faith could overturn one’s rational commitment!
It is deeply saddening for me to witness how the ruling party of India is currently propagating mythical fantasies or constructs as “history”; how it conjures up the illusory “Sanatan Bharat” with the help of superstitious reliance⤡ on the supremacy of an age that never truly existed in the first place!
Your Ram Mandir chief priest, Acharya Satyendra Das, was recently given a “water burial” in the Sarayu river⤡. Did that not pollute the river, too? What about that? It seems Hindutvavadins don’t really care about the contaminated state of the “Holy Ganges”!
Now, let me return to your prospective DHFL movement…
See, I live in a moneyless condition, so I don’t have to worry about the money-signifier that arbitrarily equalizes two unequal entities as much as you do. What the so-called paramavaiṣṇava has done by adversely possessing the DHFL by acquiring 45k crore assets for merely a rupee is perhaps an event of shame and ridicule. He achieved this solely due to his familial and crony connections to the ruling party of India. However, it is also to be seen that he is facing a number of legal troubles simultaneously due to multiple ongoing cases against him, including the Flashnet Scam⤡ ⤡, the Digwal pollution⤡ affair, the DHFL scam itself, the Electoral Bonds scam⤡, and more. He has also been reprimanded twice by SEBI⤡ ⤡ for pursuing his profiteering schemes without regard for the interests of innocent victims of financial abuse. Instead, he is preoccupied with constructing skyscrapers in the highly eco-sensitive coastal regions of Mumbai under his deceptive real estate business. He cunningly merges and demerges companies⤡ under his conglomerate to evade legal responsibilities: hold him accountable there and make him answer! Hence, attack him in any way you can—these are the points you have in your favour.
I am giving you a task: go and dislike this corporate paramavaiṣṇava’s videos on Youtube! Put comments on whatever he has allegedly done to innocent citizens and to the natural environment throughout his business career. Remember, the enemy only exists as a re-presentation, operating through shifting images and simulated spectacles. Once you destroy the simulated representation, you destroy the crony oligarch at once! Haven’t you watched the first scene of Bruce Lee’s Enter the Dragon⤡? This is the teaching of Buddhism, Daoism and other great pathways of life.
Now, what I have to say here is that you have a much better opportunity at the moment to amplify your voices in the world through the internet, the ever-expanding cyberworld. Create a toolkit, use hashtags, make digital posters, films, plays, reels after researching or investigating this particular event of the DHFL scam. I also do have the experience in being part of an online movement when I did climate activism for a couple of years. However, I left the group after hearing accusations of green corporate funding. Regardless, my experience taught me to be active and not apathetic without falling into the trap of capitalist hegemonic subsumption!
We: But guruji, We lack the time, team, and expertise to execute these actions. An event management team and crowdfunding seem necessary, but how can we get to that after all? Moreover, most Indian senior citizens aren’t tech-savvy enough to participate widely. Speaking up gets us unfairly tagged—the ruling party goons brand us anti-Hindu or anti-nationals, while the political opposition sees no political gain in supporting us. The ruling party’s IT cell actively suppresses our voice. The elderly, with limited resources, struggle to fight, while the young hesitate to spend more chasing losses. With no strong backing, recovering our money remains an endless battle.
Saint: Why are you constantly thinking in terms of a large-scale, corporate model? Start small and simple, yet crucial and effective. Can’t you spare 15 minutes a day to like, share, and comment on platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, WordPress, and so on? I have heard from some of my followers that some of the DHFL victims have prepared delicious dishes for you on their online platform, Once in a Blue Moon Academia. Are you not brave enough to savour and share those already prepared dishes?
I despise cowards! So, gather your courage and move toward your goal by taking action instead of remaining passively inactive. Thus said the scripture:
उद्योगिनं पुरुषसिंहमुपैति लक्ष्मी-
-र्दैवेन देयमिति कापुरुषा वदन्ति |
दैवं निहत्य कुरु पौरुषमात्मशक्त्या
यत्ने कृते यदि न सिध्यन्ति कोत्र दोषः ||
It means that the Goddess of Wealth, Lakṣmī, favors those men (sic; sexism unintended) who are diligent like a lion. The phrase “It will be by God or luck” is often used by cowards. Therefore, set aside luck and strive hard; if success still eludes you, the deficiency is not on your part.
[After returning to our respective hometowns following this brief yet moving encounter, we were no longer demotivated. It felt as though we had a voice, but would anyone truly listen?]
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