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Ramdev's fast more a yoga camp than protest

In his one man show, people present are there only for him and would support him on anything he says anyway.

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It’s a shivir, not a political protest and everyone is here on Baba’s orders. Even as Ramdev asked prime minister Manmohan Singh to demonstrate ‘political honesty and political will’ to bring back black money and added land acquisition and farmers issues to his agenda on the second day of the fast, it did not seem to really matter to his larger number of supporters what the cause is. In his one man show, people present are there only for him and would support him on anything he says anyway.

Ramdev has used his accurate and healing yogic powers ingeniously to build a supporter base that trusts everything else he says. Women make their presence felt in the two sections reserved for them. “I was very unwell for 5 years and allopathy had given up on me. Only Baba’s yoga could cure me. Now I trust everything baba says because he doesn’t lie”, says Ramlata who has an imitation jewellery shop in Hyderabad. Everyone here has the same story.

Having been cured by yoga, they went on to become yoga teachers with the Swabhiman Manch, where they now take classes. Their understanding of baba’s mission is vague, restricted to ‘swabhiman’ and ‘desh prem’ and the conversation doesn’t turn to black money and corruption till you bring it up. The ground too had a yoga class held in the morning.

Balasubramanian, chairman and organising secretary of Bharat Swabhiman Trust, Chennai explains the reason behind the large numbers.

“When people join Patanjali yoga, we also tell them they have to become members of the Swabhiman Manch. This was not so 4 years ago, but Baba has been more aggressive about this for the last two and a half years”, he says.

Apart from the Swabhiman manch, four other organisations run under Ramdev — Patanjali Yog Samiti, Patanjali Mahila, Kisan Manch and Yuva Manch. Coming under the Patanjali Yogapeeth, these organisations run all over the country in urban and rural areas, from where people have gathered at Ramlila in groups of sometimes even 500 and more in trains or buses arranged for them.

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