‘Orange People’ defended

Press, 2 October 1979, Page 1

‘Orange People’ defended

A former Christchurch telex operator has leapt to the defence of the Indian philosophicalreligious group known as the “Orange People.”

Ma Diva Sudhira is a member of the Rajneesh Ashram Foundation, followers of the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, who began to attract followers to his teachings in India in the mid-19605. The sect members are commonly known as the Orange People, because they wear loose orange robes, and Ma Diva Sudhira is no exception. She approached “The Press” because she thinks the news media have been giving the followers of Bhagwan a hard time, particularly since it was linked with the Crosby killings in France. “It sounds as if she just knew some Sannyasins in Adelaide,” she said. “The police in Australia discounted it —- they know it is not like that — but even if she was a Sannyasin. she certainly was not killed for trying to leave it — you can come and go any time.” An article in “The Press” on Saturday about a drug haul also annoyed her. It said that there had been “two big drug hauls” in the last week which had put Auckland’s drug squad “on top of an India-based mystic cult heavily in-

volved in drugs, sex, violence and alcohol.” Detectives were reported to have seized 13kg of hashish worth about $140,000 from Orange People. Ma Diva Sudhira, who has recently returned to Christchurch after a 12year absence to see the place where she received her “childhood conditioning,” said that she found the words “mystic,” “cult” and “sect” misleading with regard to the Orange People.

“We are not a cult or a sect,” she said. “These words have connotations of brain washing. We are disciples of an enlightened master — there are about 100,000 of us now. It is growing all the time. We are totally free. We are just asked to meditate and to wear orange. Every Sannyasin (Orange Person) is different. We are not like the Moonies or the Divine Light people, giving money to someone who is rich and telling us what to do.”

She said it was obvious that whoever wrote that Yvonne Crosby and her daughter were killed because Miss Crosby knew too much about the Orange People had done no research into the sect. Some of Bhagwan's disciples are Diana Ross, Terence Stamp and the Marquis of Bath,” she said.

“They are not going to join something they are unable to get out of, or would get shot if they knew too much.”

Referring to the Auckland story, she said, “the fact that two people who were arrested with hash were the disciples of Sannyasin does not mean it is synonymous with it. We do not go to India and load up our suitcases with hash and fly all over the world. “Sure, some people smoke dope in India, but they are doing that everywhere. The master’s work is based on meditation. When you do it daily you do not need any of these things: drugs, sex, violence, tobacco, alcohol.” Ma Diva Sudhira spent seven months in India at her master’s ashram at Poona, about I6okm into the hills from Bombay. She says the whole place has now become a “hotel” for the Sannyasins. She hopes to go back there in December — “if it feels right” — to be near her guru again. She said that he was “enlightened” about 28 years ago and travelled around India for 12 years, teaching his philosophy, “and peonle started flooding to him. “He is helping people to live, not to carry burdens of guilt and the conditioning and reoressions of childhood,” she said. His philosophy included the

teachings of both Jesus and Buddha. Five years ago he had 500 followers, now it was more like 100,000, she said.

She had visited India twice on her travels — “just searching and suffering” — before she went there as a disciple of Bhagwen. She was introduced to some Orange People in London and learned to meditate, “and after about five months it came to me to take Sannyasins — you fall in love with him,” she said.

Wearing the orange is “a crazy gesture — it’s the colour 'of the rising sun, a very beautiful high

energy colour,” she said.

In Christchurch there are “five to six” Orange People, and about 30 or 40 around Nelson “living on the land.” As well, there were a lot of New Zealand Orange People overseas, she said.

Ma Diva Sudhira lives on her savings from money earned as a telex operator, mostly in Australia “where the wages are good.” She is writing a novel. “I’m not telling anyone what it’s about. It’s my one shot at a best seller. My ego still gives me the need to have fame and fortune. I feel I can do it so I want to try — to see that I can do it and then don’t need it.”