Prem Rawat's (Maharaji) Films and Videos from the mid-1980's on

Calcutta 1984, records parts of the Holi festival held in that place in that year. The video contains no English dialogue anf had deteriorted significantly before it was digitised.

It contains footage of the usual apparently chaotic crowd scenes in a festival in India with scenes of a large scale Holi spraying and a quick scene of Maharaji divine dancing, some satsang given in Hindi and lots of discordant singing

Contact, a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) release, was produced in 1987/8.

It contains footage of a festival in India with Holi, Darshan and divine dancing, sound-bites of premies, some satsang given in Australia and flight footage not just of the jet-of-the-day but his helicopter and his glider as well and the big ballad has scenes of Rawat producing the recording of 'I Need To Feel It' which is the featured big, inspirational ballad.

There is a very definite exposition of Rawat's position in the lineage of Perfect Masters and their role as the unique giver of true experience rather than doctrine and dogma.

Los Angeles Public Program transcript Prem Rawat's (Maharaji) speech in Los Angeles, California, February 21, 1988
Prem Rawat made this speech in February, 1988 to a group that mainly consisted of his followers. Thank God I'd realized Knowledge was a crock of sh*t and stopped listening to Rawat before he decided he was a sophisticated man of the world and fascinating raconteur. He repeats an idea he's used many times, that your life will end up as nothing but a dash on a tombstone i.e. if you don't worship him.

Wembley Public Program transcript Prem Rawat's (Maharaji) speech in Wembley, London, April 21 1988
By the time Rawat gave this speech in Wembley England one could get a better perspective on his talents because he had metamorphosed from a dwarfish lump of lard running around ranting, raving, screaming and frothing at the mouth that everyone should surrender to him, worship him and pray to him into a what he obviously believed was a comedic and inspirational raconteur a la Garrison Keillor, Billy Connolly or Robin Williamson and a polymath showing off his enormous and erudite vocabulary as does Stephen Fry. Actually he was shiite.

Birthday Gift, India '88 has no attribution but was produced in 1988/89. My copy may have been recorded from a satellite broadcast. It is part of a series that includes "Evolution", "Windows In Time", "I Have This Knowledge" and "Passages" that attempt to show an extremely upbeat version of Rawat's early career in the West and a coherent evolution of his career and teachings while allowing his devotees watching it to briefly relive their youth during the exciting, overtly divine and devotional, optimistic and successful public phase of his career. This film seems to have been produced in India and has speeches by Rawat in Hindi and some images of Rawat dressed as Krishna and others that were not shown in any similar Western videos.

Windows In Time, an ILC (International Learning Center) production and a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) release, was premiered at the 'Festival of Knowledge' in Miami, July 1989. It contains historical footage from India and a ridiculously upbeat view of Rawat's early career in the West. In the 1970's the press had been nearly 100% critical and derisive of the 'fat boy guru'.

There is extensive footage of an "interview" with Prem Rawat in the back seat of a car from the late 80's and some of his 'students' providing revisionist spin on his early days in the West and rare footage of his childhood in India. It ends with an inspirational series of clips of his life over 'Teach Me Devotion' with late 1980's lyrics.

Don't miss the super clear explanation of the commitment required to practise Knowledge, at least, that's what I think it's about.

Festival Of Knowledge, an ILC (International Learning Center) production and a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) release, contains footage of sections of his speeches at a meeting of his followers in Brussels in 1989 and songs and montages of crowd scenes.

Rawat hasn't yet learnt to pronounce 'wisdom' which is certainly appropriate. Even after his Western followers have practised his "Knowledge" for nearly 20 years he has to emphasise hope and trust in him as the living Master and the inability of his followers to know anything on their complicated and uncertain path. He voices his sneering caricature of normal human lives and work that he has picked up from cartoons and sitcoms. He sneers at people working to make others rich without appearing to see the incredible irony of a rich parasite Master whose wealth and opulent lifestyle is totally based upon donations from those very workers.The emotional highlight is another Kim O'Leary self-reviling ballad in which Rawat's "love" must continually save her (and by extension all of Rawat's devotees) from her imperfections, depressions, lack of trust and, presumably, belief in her inability to meditate.

Evolution, an ILC (International Learning Center) production was produced in 1989. It is part of a series that includes "Windows In Time", "I Have This Knowledge" and "Passages" that attempt to show an extremely upbeat version of Rawat's early career in the West and a coherent evolution of his career and teachings while allowing his devotees watching it to briefly relive their youth during the exciting, overtly divine and devotional, optimistic and successful public phase of his career. It is certainly not an accurate picture of the history of Rawat's life and career but it is an accurate picture of how he wanted that presented in 1989 within the constraints of available archival film. It contains more extensive footage of his father and his early life in India than the others in this series but is amateurish by comparison with an intrusive, mediocre soundtrack.

A Freedom Call, is a © I.L.C, (Internation Learning Center) d.b.a. Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) production and was released in 1991. It begins with a reading by Prem Rawat of some doggerel, presumably written by Rawat, that appears to be based on, or at least inspired by, a well-know poem "High Flight" by John Magee. It can hardly be called plagiarism as it so laughably bad it would probably qualify as satire if he didn't declaim it so earnestly. The soundtrack sounds like Vangelis has dashed something off while on the toilet and in a hurry to go somewhere else, urgently, and then recorded it in the taxi on the way to the airport. Rawat is a master of verbosity delivered in mangled syntax and poor pronunciation and here he relates another long-winded story about the birth of a bird, making this everyday event a "miracle". He calls the first flight magical and then derides human life, without his Knowledge the "one certain special way" to happiness, as being as pointless and miserable as a bird trapped in a gilded cage.

Can You Imagine, is a © I.L.C, (Internation Learning Center) d.b.a. Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) production and was released in 1991. It is typical of his early 1990s speeches and very different to those he gave in the 1970s and early 1980s. It begins with Rawat's take on the creation of planet Earth and the Prem Rawat Theory of Evolution. It is full of his repetitious shtick using his new vocabulary: appreciation, compassion, dignity, heart, feeling, fulfil, fulfilment, fulfilled, gift, gratitude, joy, longing, magic, thirst, ultimate, virtue. Then there are bad words: definition, dogma, logic, philosophy, pride. He seems to think that he is daring and shocking by reiterating that death is the final solutoin for all lives and there is no proof of reincarnation.

Beggar, a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) video, was released in 1994. Beggar is a short (21 minutes) video made of excerpts of Rawat's speeches to 'aspirants' - an Élan Vital term for people who are interested enough in Rawat's "Knowledge" to regularly attend screenings of his videos. It combines these excerpts with brief 'natural' scenes and some excerpts from "Without Your Love" a One Foundation song written and sung by Geoff Bridgeford which also ends the video to provide the inspiring, emotionally uplifting ending that Rawat's speeches cannot convey and that are a staple of videos about Rawat. While it is mainly vacuous expressions of unattainable states of Being, it contains some exposition of the central dogmas of his religion that have remained constant through the decades. The most obvious is the extraordinary onus he places on the necessity to beg him, as the current Perfect Master in the line of Perfect Masters which are incarnations of God and includes Krishna, Ram, Buddha, Jesus, Kabir, Guru Govind Singh and his father, Hans Rawat for the "Knowledge". He claims these have all revealed the same secret Knowledge and that it is the only source of peace in the world.

The Journey is the Destination, a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) production, was released in 1994.

It includes Rawat answering the questions:

• Is Knowledge the only Path?
• Should we be Vegetarians?
• How does Spirituality Correlate to Knowledge?

and Rawat reading from Kabir. There are pretty graphics. The audience response during the answer to 'How does Spirituality Correlate to Knowledge?' is interesting.

Like The Rain, a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) release, was released in 1996.

It contains the 'Blessing of the Master' sermon, Maharaji dancing briefly, a Holi festival where some people are collecting the charanamrit and a quick glimpse of a darshan line.

"So what is the blessing for a human being. Of course we've talked about life, we've talked about that breath, we've talked about this existence and yes they're all blessings. But there is another wonderful blessing and that blessing is the Master. Master, to me, is that manifestation of the yearning of the heart. If there was no yearning of the heart, believe me, there would be no Master."

In the period 1995 to 1997 Visions International produced a series of 10 short films which were later sold on Video CDs at speeches of Prem Rawat's. While they fit onto one Video CD they were sold as a set of two, presumably to maximise the financial returns. They were not merely recordings of Rawat's speeches, though they included many quotes and his daughter Daya's singing, some historical footage of his career and shots that followers could recognise as darshan lines (ie people lining up and passing before Rawat sitting on a throne and kissing his feet) though this would not be obvious to people who were not Rawat's long time students. They include "Boundless", "He's Here" and "Total embrace"

Remembrance, is a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) video, specially commissioned for Maharaji's 25th year in the West anniversary celebrations and was released in 1996. Remembrance is a short (18 minutes) video made up of excerpts of Rawat's speeches when he was the young Guru Maharaj Ji. The latest excerpt is from a speech in 1973 and there are two short segments of footage of him in 1974 and later. It is one of the series of videos made to promote nostalgia in the aging premies and to remind them of their enthusiastic and exciting youth in a movement to bring peace to the world and God-realization to their hearts though only some inoffensive quotes from his speeches are shown. The film mainly consists of video footage with an interminable Eastern sounding instrumental dirge for a soundtrack.

I Have This Knowledge, a Visions International, 1996 11 minute long video, allows premies to reminisce watching small clips and still photos from the early 70's Divine Light Mission archives. The soundtrack is an upbeat, edited "satsang" of Prem Rawat's talking about his early life in the West, some "interviews" with members of his inner circle and pointed comments about "Indian cultural" artifacts mistakenly taken up by young Westerners of the time that Prem Rawat has "removed" from Élan Vital doctrines.

The World Of Knowledge, a Visions International 1997 17 minute long video is a montage of scenes showing the apparently annus mirabilis of Prem Rawat's success in his 1996 25th Anniversay of coming to the West. The soundtrack is mainly an upbeat, South American song, a torch song by his daughter Daya, the terribly catchy and irritating "You're My Pilot" plus a surprise ending - a reprise of Dance, Dance, Dance the hideous song written by initiator Rich Neel at the height of the super-devotional period in Divine Light Mission in the late 1970's when Prem Rawat then known as Guru Maharaj Ji used to dance half naked dressed as Krishna.

Fulfillment, a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) short (15 minutes) introductory video, was released in 1998. It combines professional sounding voice-over explanations of Prem Rawat's claims about his life, philosophy and teachings with snippets of Rawat's "satsangs". Though intended to be shown as an introduction to "Maharaji" (Great King) as he calls himself, it still contains those central dogmas of his religion that have remained constant through the decades.

"Introducing the Possibility of Knowledge", a Visions International release, was produced in 2000. It contains scenes from two training sessions Élan Vital held to teach Prem Rawat's students how to introduce people to the "possibility of Knowledge" and a speech in Miami. The "invited guests" paid dearly for the chance to be at these sessions as their Master was going to be there. Nearly all of them had been devotees of Maharaji for up to 30 years and so the idea that they needed such training was extraordinary enough in itself. What made it even more remarkable is that most of them had been doing such personal and public recruitment in the '70's quite successfully until Rawat had ordered them to cease and desist circa 1983.
A full transcript of the video is available here

Contentment Within, a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) release, was released in 2000. It is a VCD of the 42 minute long speech Rawat gave in Denver, Colorado on March 2, 1994. His pronunciation was still a little shaky on the 'w' which he pronounced 'v' and he still said 'wissdom' instead of 'wisdom' and his voice often became shrill and loud. His mature style was already fully developed.

Connect 2000 video magazine, a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) release, was released in 2000. It is a shamelessly obvious attempt to inspire his "students" to keep arranging the showing of videos of Rawat's speaking in their local area despite the failure of this approach to attract many new followers and the lack of inspiration most of them felt doing these menial and thankless tasks. While purporting to present propagation as successful it actually shows it's near complete failure except in India. It has a small section of a Knowledge Session showing the extraordinary chairs provided for these sessions. There some short scenes of his father and Rawat reveals what a canny operator he was.

Across The Decade, a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) release, was released in 2000.

It includes short sections from speeches he made throughout the 1990's and presumably they are the crème de la crème of his inspiration and insights during that time, at least according to Rawat and his editors.

Four Days In November, a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) release, was released in 2000.

It includes footage of his meetings in Delhi, India in late 1999, the last program he appeared in during the 20th century. It's highlight is the first known public performance of Prem Rawat singing in a duet with his daughter, Daya, of a bhajan and includes some ad-libbing by him and some group singing with the large audience. Unfortunately, there are only a few testimonies from premies regarding his singing and their explanations of it's effect upon them as they are very interesting.

There is a full transcript of Rawat's (Maharaji) speeches from this video is available here.

Passages - A Masters Journey, a Visions International (a division of Élan Vital Inc) video, was published during 2001 to mark the 30th anniversary of the arrival of Prem Rawat (aka Maharaji) to the West in 1971 and to provide a coherent story for Rawat's followers to counter the criticisms of him being published on the Internet some of them by his former closest associates. It contains a potted history of Maharaji's life, his family, his organizations and his "message". Several prominent followers of Maharaji were interviewed for the video giving their very similar thoughts on these criticised aspects of Rawat and his career.

It was first shown at an Élan Vital program held in Nottingham UK in 2001, then sold for a period of time and broadcast via Satellite. The video is now no longer available for purchase or distribution via Élan Vital or their sister organizations. It contains some early footage of Prem Rawat in the West, some even earlier footage of his father but definitely not of his "Holy Family" in India, interviews with about a dozen of his most trusted followers and some background material with a professional doing the voice-overs explaining the new interpretation of his past and his Knowledge in an attempt to counter accusations against him on the internet. A complete transcript is available here.

Now, for something completely different, A French documentary, critical naturellement, of unknown (to me) provenance.

This short documentary form the early 2000s was inspired and based on testimony from Jean-Michel Kahn.

Receiving Knowledge, was copied from a broadcast via Satellite.

It contains some footage of Prem Rawat in a Pre-Knowledge session, speaking and answering some questions. It also contains interviews with some people before receiving Knowledge (aspirants), directly after receiving Knowledge and up to a year later.

We have only received two clips from this video for now. In one he gives his definition of 'religion' and in another answers the question:"But can they be happy?"

One Day In September, was a "home movie" DVD.
It contains some footage of Prem Rawat attending a small birthday party at Amaroo for Cath Carrol in 2005. She was one of his most devoted Australian devotees and had often served as a media officer trying to influence reporters and deflect criticism of the "greedy guru" with her charm and Irish brogue. The age invariance of the inner circle of Australian devotees is obvious. The party instructions are given by George Laver who was Rawat's main man in Australia at the time.

INNER JOURNEY: A "Spirited" Conversation About Self Discovery
During 2004 and early 2005 Prem Rawat was "interviewed" by Burt Wolf, an obscure TV presenter based in Seattle. At that time the resultant DVD created by TPRF represents the latest attempt by Prem Rawat to garner as much respectability as possible by trying to associate himself with public figures, albeit minor public figures. One presumes that followers of Prem Rawat were able to convince Burt Wolf to provide his talking head to allow Rawat to present himself as depicted in the interview by paying him a fee over and above his usual earnings. The questions appear to have been written by followers of Prem Rawat.

On The Road With Maharaji, an Élan Vital Inc release, was released around 2005 as one of a series of thank you gifts to regular contributors who gave "Generous and consistent support.

It includes scenes of him donating money to charity, being publicly lauded by his devoted followers in 'expressions' and he does not correct the lady who talks about him being invited to talk at respected universities as if the University Authorities themselves had invited him. He introduces the Keys in this video.

This is a group of 5 short videos downloaded from Youtube.

• 2008 In Review Highlights of Maharaji's travels and speeches in 2008
• Freedom Bird Maharaji recites one of his poems
• Maharaji Remembers Shri Hans Ji Maharaji a short Words Of Peace Global video posted on Youtube, in which Maharaji reminisces about his father
• Maharaji Speaks at Kolkata University Maharaji answers questions from students at Kolkata (Calcutta)
• Settlement A short speech in Hindi interspersed with a bhajan

One Day In September This is something of a "home movie" filmed at Amaroo in 2010. It is far less professional than most of the media taken of Rawat and almost shows him as he really is. He attends a birthday party for one of his dedicated Australian volunteers. He does not appear confident and stands off from the small crowd of his devotees with his arms folded, leaning away from the crowd and looks uncomfortable. His interactions with Ms Carroll and honcho George Laver seem stilted and forced. I can't remember who gave me a copy but presumably it was one of the attendees who didn;t like what he or she saw that afternoon.

Peacemakers: Jeremy Gilley in Conversation with Prem Rawat, is a Words Of Peace Global (WOPG) video and was released in 2013 as part of - the most successful part of - Rawat's ongoing campaign to gain a public reputation as a respected longtime campaigner for world peace and not as a failed godboy messiah and wealthy, minor cult leader. Gilley appears to be overawed by Rawat, fawning and grateful to be in the "great man's" presence though his intellectual background is evident as he repeats the breathless claim that Rawat is a "Jedi knight." This is Rawat's first public conversation with someone who has talked to world leaders and Hollywood stars. He is now one degree of separation from respectability though of course he is no degree of separation from his elder brother, the Indian politican and Godman Satpal Maharaj, but as Rawat has been disowned by his family that doesn't really count.

Various Amaroo video clips.

Musician
Author
Poet
Lyricist
Inventor
Patenter
Gardener
The Speaker
Inspirational Speaker
World Renowned Teacher of Inner Peace
Master
Teacher Of Devotion
Perfect Master
Satguru
Indian Royalty

Bolie Shri Satguru Dev Maharaji Ki Jai