Prem Rawat's 120th Hans Jayanti Celebration, 2020
This is a thought-provoking title.
Interesting to think about what the young guru said about the Knowledge and bliss and how he now talks truthfully about the worries and fears he then had. The very people who were convinced by his omniblissience now still accept him as their Master though his claims of being an ever blissful Perfect Master on which their acceptance was based, he later revealed were false. Those people who were later
Hans Jayanti is a longstanding Indian festival that celebrates the birth of Shri Hans Ji Maharaj, the divine Incarnation of God and Satguru and father of Prem Rawat. The 120th Hans Jayanti event was celebrated on November 8 - 9, 2020 in New Delhi. In fact this was not the 120th Hans Jayanti festival, it could only be Hans Jayanti festival clebrating the 120th year since the birth of Hans Rawat whose son later declared him to be His Royal Highness Yogiraj Param Hans Sadgurudev Shri Hans ji Maharaj or Yogiraj Param Hans Satgurudev Shri Hans ji Maharaj as he titled himself. This festival has been atracting attendances of hundreds of thousands of people but it peaked in 1970 when more than a million people gathered to witness the young Prem Rawat declared he had incarnated with more powers than Ram of Krishna and he had come to rule the world. He did demonstrate that he had a supreme power of bombastic exaggeration. We have an official History of Hans Jayanti and records of many 1970s Hans Jayantis but after 1970 they were something of a letdown, comparatively.
- In 1997 Rawat recalled a memory of being an early riser greeting the dawn and basking in the magic of the light shining, reflecting and refracting in the dew. This is something not recorded in our records before. His eldest son recalls him always arising late, being looked after by his valet and then going directly to his office. Over his career Rawat has made desultory statements about beautiful sunrises and sunsets but I could find only a hanful of mentions of his actually talking about being awake to enjoy a sunrise on the dew or going out to see a sunset. Rawat loves gadgets, machinery and technology. He occasionally spoke to his new 1970s "hippie" followers' romantic views of nature while demanding conformity and organisation and always directing them to provide him with technology, luxury and expensive cars and aeroplanes.
- Nearly every child will love and respect his father and Hans Rawat was a successful guru, with enough financial support to have an ashram, live in upper class Indian style and being driven in automobiles by a chauffeur/bodyguard. The young Rawat has often spoken of his father beating people with sticks and his own fear of punishment over his school reports, a fear that drove him to form a cheating ring where he paid other boys to do his homework.
Prem Rawat's 120th Hans Jayanti Rminiscences, 2020
I definitely remember waking up in the morning. I was the first one up. And I just couldn't wait for the light to start coming through the window, because then it was time to get up, wake up, and embrace the day. And I was very, very young. And in the morning, there would be dew there. And just to look at every drop that I could, the sun shone upon it. It just sparkled, and I could see the rainbows, and I could see all these things. And it was so small, but so magnificent. I was there, part of that magic that unfolded every morning.
Every morning. There he is. The first relationship, as I'm learning to speak, I call his name. And what I call him is Baji. A lot of people are calling him Shri Maharaji. And that was a title, again, that was given to him, out of respect, totally out of respect, for what he had done in their lives. He's my father. He was quite strict, by the way, quite strict. Very loving, but very strict. Yet, for the people, there's an incredible amount of reverence for him. And I'm looking at this, it's just normal to me. And this is who he is. He has this relationship with me. He teases me that, am I going to be doing this someday? And I said, yes. He says, and how are you going to do it? And I say, not like you. I'm not going to do it like you. I'm going to do it with quite a bit of love. And he just laughs at it. But most of the time, I miss him. Because he's out traveling. And when he comes, that day is a very special day. And it's exciting. And it's just off-the-scale excitement that he's going to be there. It was so magical. It was so magical. All these thousands of people would come to see him. And to be in this sea of people. And all these people have come there with one focus. And they have come to know a little bit about themselves. And then, he would sit down and he would start talking and he would go to pin drop silence.
In fact, one time, I had organized an event in Dehradun for him. And I had requested that he come to that event. Then I hear that he's not coming. So I sent a letter saying, you are going to come, aren't you? Well, he got the letter. He realized that he had promised this to me. And so he canceled his tour and he came. And so I was just really excited. This is great. All my friends, all my school teachers, the principal all get to hear what this is all about. Of course, he asked me to put on my school uniform. The gray pants and blue blazer and the dark burgundy and blue tie. And I'm all set up. And he says, okay, now you speak. I'm mortified. I'm like, oh, my God, no, not in front of my teachers. And, oh, by the way, speak in English. And he just said, you know, to everyone, he says, don't look at his body. He's very young. He's very small. Listen to what he's saying. It's very important. There I go. And I got up. And, you know, nothing was rehearsed. There was not an idea of performance. It was something that I was really saying from my heart. And that message was, again, it was all about things that I had felt in my life, that there is magic, that there is joy. The source of that joy, the source of that magic is in me.
And this was just woven in and out up until I was nine years of age to receive this, to be a part of this. The fact that I even got one day of that in my life, I feel I'm very fortunate. Just one.
Fortunately we have many published official records of his speeches and many transcribed from audio tapes and films. He might have been talking from his heart but it sounds far more likely that he was parrotting the concepts he was being directly taught and those he imbibed in the ashram air. See for yourself.
Divine Light Mission publications (1970s) Containing Speeches of the young Prem Rawat
- Divine Light: Earliest magazine published in the West by DLM in England, copies - June 1971 to February 1974M
- Read Think And Know Cheap English language pamphlet that contains the teachings of Hans Rawat published in India November, 1971
- Satguru Maharaj Ji Early booklet from the USA that appears to have been published in late 1971.
- Reflections on an Indian Sunrise Early Divine Light Mission pamphlet/magazine from the USA published in early 1972.
- And It Is Divine Monthly glossy magazine published for general public (sort of), copies - 1972 to 1977 Millenium '73 Festival Issue
- Divine Times: Monthly magazine published in the USA, copies - 1973 to 1980
- The Golden Age and The Divine Light News were the official Australian Divine Light Mission magazines and were published from 1973 to 1979. My own copies were burnt in 1982 by my more obedient partner after I had packed them up for storage as essential texts that documented important parts of my life in the 1970's. Fortunately copies had been archived at the Australian National Library and these are still freely available.
- Élan Vital: Full color quarterly magazine published in the USA from 1977 to 1980
- Affinity: Color quarterly A5 size magazine published in Ireland, copies - 1978 to 1980
Local Community Publications
- Brotherly Love: a Philadelphia DLM community newsletter published in 1974 - 1976 (at least)
- Hidden Light: a Washington DC DLM community newsletter published in 1974 - 1975 (at least)
- Light Reading: a Denver DLM community newsletter published in 1977 - 1977 (at least)
- IN LOVE: North American A4 size East Orange, New Jersey local community magazine , copies - 1977/78
- Coming Together Part of the August, 1974 issue of a local Denver, Colorado DLM magazine
- For Your Inspiration The first and possibly only issue of an "international premie newsletter" 1975
