Belated baba black sheep list.. Gurmeet, Asaram, Radhe Ma and Nirmala Baba included in the list of 14 fake Sadhus

Piyush Srivastava, TT, Lucknow, Sept. 10: An apex body of sadhus today released a list of 14 "fake sadhus" and demanded a law against these "charlatans", but had to face questions why it had honoured some of them earlier.

Narendra Giri, president of the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad, accused "self-styled cult leaders" like the jailed Asaram Bapu and Gurmeet Ram Rahim of giving sadhus a bad name as he released the list at a news conference in Allahabad.

Asked why he and other akhara heads had earlier feted such "charlatans" and welcomed them into their monasteries, Narendra told The Telegraph over the phone: "It happened because some people misled us. We'll be careful in future."

He appealed to "common people to beware of such charlatans" and said copies of the list would be sent to the Centre, state governments and Opposition parties with the demand for a law to check these people's activities.

"We'll expose these fake sadhus and write to the government to investigate their activities and arrest them," Narendra, who has held two meetings with chief minister Yogi Adityanath in the past five months "for sadhus' welfare", said.

The Parishad is an umbrella organisation of 13 akharas - monastic orders started in the 8th century by Adi Shankaracharya that are scattered across Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Rajasthan.

The 14 blacklisted spiritual leaders are Gurmeet, Asaram and son Narayan Sai, Radhe Ma aka Sukhwinder Kaur, Nirmal Baba aka Nirmaljeet Singh, Khushi Maharaj, Sachidanand Giri aka Sachin Datta, Om Baba aka Vivekanand Jha, Ichchhadhari Bhimanand aka Ram Murat Dwivedi, Rampal, Swami Aseemanand, Om Namo Shivay Baba, Brihaspati Giri and Malkan Giri.

Of them, Gurmeet, Asaram, Rampal and Ichchhadhari are in jail, convicted or accused of various crimes including sexual ones, while Asaram's son Narayan Sai is out on bail.

Yet almost all 14 had been feted at some or other religious congregation at Sangam in Allahabad in the past, with the Parishad itself recommending space for their camps to the state government during Magh Mela or Kumbh.

The Juna Akhara had anointed Radhe Ma, a married woman from Haryana, as Mahamandaleshwar (one who has attained the highest levels of spirituality) in Haridwar in January 2013. A year later, the Parishad stripped her of the title when a controversy erupted around her.

Ichchhadhari, arrested from his home in Chitrakoot in February 2010 on charges of running a flesh trade from his Delhi ashram, is said to have graced many akhara events.

Sachin Datta, a realtor who owned a bar in Noida and was close to the Samajwadi Party, was anointed Mahamandaleshwar in July 2015 at Sangam by the Niranjani Akhara, with Narendra playing a key role in the matter.

Mahant Gyan Das, the then Parishad president, had called it "a political decision in which some Parishad members are involved", and eventually revoked the honour over Narendra's protests. Narendra replaced Gyan Das as president last year.

Narendra claimed he had yesterday received a phone call from someone who claimed to be a devotee of Asaram and "threatened to kill me if a mention was made of his guru in the list of fake _sadhus we were planning to bring out today", a PTI report said.

"An FIR has been lodged, based on a complaint from Giri. The matter is being investigated," Allahabad senior superintendent of police Anand Kulkarni said.