Prem Rawat's Opulent Lifestyle
Prem Rawat has an opulent lifestyle, an extremely opulent lifestyle. He makes no bones about that. He makes no apologies for it. This is quite remarkable as his mother cut off the family income when she disowned and disinherited him when he was 16 years old and he failed in his legal bids to gain control of his father's property in the Indian courts. He has never had any paid employment and didn't finish high school. He claims he is a successful private investor and inventor but of course all of his income came from donations and presents from his followers. He pretends otherwise. See for example details of one of his most lucrative gifts, millions of dollars worth of stock in Deltek gifted by Don de Laski. Search his sites TPRF or Maharaji Net or 2008 - Words Of Peace Global and there will be no hint that to this day much of his income derives from the donations of his followers nor that these donations flow more freely whenever he has darshan lines nor that fund-raising drives for specific purposes are still common in Élan Vital nor that most of the funds donated to the Prem Rawat Foundation are used to pay for his luxury travel and less than 30% goes to charitable work. Reams of publicity about his opulent and drearily vulgar lifestyle (lots of television cartoons, pinball playing, eating, eating, eating and driving fast cars fast) was freely available while he had some media interest.
As Jesus Christ said: "She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, and you can help them any time you want. But you will not always have me. She did what she could." In Prem Rawat's case there are many people who understand the correct way to treat a Perfect Master. He has a luxury mansion in Malibu. He makes no bones about that. He makes no apologies for it. He has sold his $7 million dollar yacht, 'Serenity'. He makes no apologies for that.
Bob Mishler, the President of Divine Light Mission at the time, revealed that by 1976 Rawat "had at least three Mercedes, a couple of Rolls Royces, and least three or four other luxurious automobiles in the 30 or 40,000 dollar range. I mean, it wasn't just a question of having one, he had a whole fleet." Much of his wealth was provided by the church (Divine Light Mission was registered as a church) and anything he wanted he expected Divine Light Mission to provide no matter what the church's financial position was. Rawat also had "a great deal of income that comes to him in the tax-free form of gifts from his followers. How he uses that; well, when I was there, he was spending it. It was just amazing how much money he could spend."
He does not have a larger fleet of cars than the deceased Bhagwan Rajneesh had though he does have a very large fleet of very fine autos and a full-time mechanic. He does fly around the world in a private jet telling people to experience complete inner peace and joy from within rather than from possessions. If you have problems with people who are rich just remember what Prem Rawat has said about this:
"You know some people don't like rich people. They have this idea or that idea of what it is to be rich. But they really don't know. It's not easy to be rich. It isn't. Once you've made your first million, you need another to protect it. Then you have two million, and you'll need another two million to protect those two million. Then you'll have four million and you'll need another four million to protect those four million, and then you'll have eight million. Of course then you'll need another 8 million to protect those eight million and then you'll have 16 million… it isn't easy, it's not what you think."
Naturally, the media documented his greed and need for earthly opulence because that was out in the open.
Maharaji speaking at Long Beach 1995
1. The Bible, New Testament, The Gospel of Mark 14:3-9