SERGUEI BADAEV

SSEHV STATISTICS

Refuting Deceptive News About Sathya Sai Baba On SaiSathyaSai.com

January 2005 ::: Serguei Badaev ::: SSEHV Statistics:

Questionability of the Sathya Sai Education in Human Values Statistics

THE QUESTIONABILITY OF THE SSEHV STATISTICS
Sergey Badaev
(badaev57@mtu-net.ru)
January, 2005

My Response: Notice that this article was written in January of 2005. The significance of this will be made shortly.

SSEHV stands for the Sathya Sai Education in Human Values Programme, which is currently the basis of the educational activity of the Sathya Sai Organisation (SSO). The educational activity of the SSO started in 1969 when the educational wing of the SSO was created as an outcome of the 3rd All India Conference at Prashanthi Nilayam, the main Sathya Sai Baba ashram in India. At the very beginning the programme was focused mostly on devotees' children and was known as the Bal Vikas programme, but later it was spread even to public schools under the name of EHV.

Despite the fact of the long history (over 30 years since 1969) and regular reports sent from Sai centres to the Central Office of the SSO, the information on the development of the educational activity of the SSO is rather scarce. This article is based mostly on the special issue of the Bal Vikas magazine published by Sri Sathya Sai Bal Vikas Education Trust on the occasion of the 75th birthday of Sathya Sai Baba in 2000. In the preface Mrs Sarla I. Shah, a Joint Central Co-ordinator of the SSO, writes: "And now comes the important prophesy from "Earth changes Report" - San Francisco that "The education system as we know it will go through a major transition by 2005-2006. A global committee, developed by non-educators and educators alike will conduct a study on education, the result of which will be a proposal for new ways to educate our children. Great insights will come out of this, as a Spiritual Master now living in India, brings forth a new teaching process". As if in support of this prophesy, Bhagavan (=SSB) has blessed world body of Education UNESCO to hold a International Conference of World Educators, on "Human Values Education" at Prashanthi Nilayam in September, 2000".

The conference which had been planned to become a sort of a breakthrough for world wide recognition turned to be a complete failure and fiasco, when UNESCO and Flinder's University which were co-organisers of this conference withdrew from any participation. Moreover UNESCO published a Media Advisory, which among the other reasons mentions that "the Organization is deeply concerned about widely-reported allegations of sexual abuse involving youths and children that have been levelled at the leader of the movement in question, Sathya Sai Baba". (http://saiguru.net/english/news/000915unesco.htm)

My Response: Serguei Badaev is trying to mislead the general public by not divulging the real reason behind the UNESCO and Flinder's University withdrawal from the conference. Click Here to read my article about the real reason behind the UNESCO and Flinder's Universtiy withdrawal and how Anti-Sai Activists boasted how they accomplished it.

Nevertheless this magazine issue is valuable because it gives us a rare example of statistics concerning quantitative growth of the educational activity of the SSO. These statistics were reproduced in the daily newspaper THE HINDU, September 25, 2000 (p.15).

My Response: Serguei Badaev does not even tell us the name to The Hindu article. He just gave a date. Serguei Badaev did not provide the text to the articles either. Thus, we must rely solely on Serguie Badaev's interpretations and perspective. Oddly enough, Serguei Badaev often criticizes the Sathya Sai Org for its lack of transparency. However, in this poorly referenced article, the standard that Serguei Badaev uses is hardly fair, open or transparent.

Serguei Badaev obviously read my article about the extreme decrease in Anti-Sai propaganda articles and decided to do something about it by writing this poorly referenced article. Serguei is commenting on articles that were written in September of 2000 (or almost four and a half years ago). This once again points to the desperation that motivates Anti-Sai Activists to disperse Anti-Sai propaganda even if it is four and half years old (and took four and a half years for them to find and finally write about). Click Here to read my article about the decline of Anti-Sai propaganda articles, despite obsessive nitpicking. Obviously, the obsessive nitpicking has resumed.


Unfortunately, neither the magazine issue, nor THE HINDU gives any explanations of the figures. It is supposed to be the statistics for India only as the term Bal Vikas has been used mostly for India. However there is a clear discrepancy between the figures demonstrated in the graph and those presented in one of the articles in this magazine. Dr B. G. Pitre mentions in his article (p.16): "By 1979 it (=Bal Vikas) had practically spread to every district of India. Over 50,000 children were receiving education under 3,400 trained teachers". At the same time according to the graph in 1979 there were over 33,000 students and 2,000 teachers in Bal Vikas. This example shows us a typical inaccuracy in the Sai Movement when it comes to numbers. Factual and number accuracy is a basic element of the scientific culture. But this inaccuracy is not surprising if we take into account that the SSO only follows in this respect its spiritual leader, Sathya Sai Baba, who often exaggerates numbers (http://home.no.net/anir/Sai/saiorg/AZ.htm) and neglects facts (http://bdsteel.tripod.com/More/storyhijack.htm).

My Response: This is very amusing. Despite the fact that neither The Hindu Newspaper nor the Bal Vikas Magazine provided any information about the graph, Serguei Badaev used the graph to criticize the SSEHV programme by drawing erroneous assumptions about its meaning and significance. If no information was provided about the graph, how does Serguei know what it is about?

Where did the graph come from? Who made the graph? Where did the figures come from? How were the figures compiled? The SSEHV specifically addresses Bal Vikas as "Bal Vikas". Does this graph truly refer to SSEHV Bal Vikas? If so, why does it refer to the Bal Vikas as "students"? Why are the schools called "centers"? Centers would apply to Bal Vikas study groups in oversea centers. In India, Bal Vikas do not learn in centers, but in schools.

Serguei Badaev cannot answer any of these questions. Despite this fact and despite the fact that no explanation came with the graph, Serguei Badaev used the graph as an accurate reference to somehow prove that the SSEHV gave misleading statistics. How can Serguei draw this conclusion when he clearly said that neither The Hindu Newspaper nor the Bal Vikas Magazine gave any information about the graph? Since Serguei Badaev refused (why?) to provide the full, original text to The Hindu Newspaper article and the Bal Vikas Magazine, one cannot ascertain in what context the graph was used.

Another interesting point can be revealed when we look at the years presented in the graph. From 1975 to 1983 the data are given for every other year. After that, the data are given only for 1993 and 2000. I am afraid that it might have a specific reason. In the article of Dr B. G. Pitre (p.17) we can read: "By 1989, thousands of teachers were trained and hundreds of schools had adopted the new curriculum in India. Several State Governments and agencies had accepted this programme. There was no doubt that a certain amount of euphoria was created in India over the rapid pace of the EHV programme. At that exact moment Baba asked the programme to be halted in India". Dr Pitre gives no details or explanations of what kind of halt that was. Doesn't he do that because of lack of knowledge or as a result of censorship (self-censorship)? It may be well suggested that this event might be connected with the abolishing without any clear reasons of the World Council in 1987, 12 years after its inception in 1975. So, the simple reason for such a presentation of the data in the graph might be to pretend a constant increase of numbers and cover up a possible fall after 1989.

My Response: Serguei's point would be valid if he knew the graph truly referred to Bal Vikas. He does not know this. As a matter of fact, he knows nothing about the graph (admittedly). Such being the case, Serguei Badaev is arguing his point mostly from speculation, assumption and conjecture. It is also important to point out that Dr. B. G. Pitre was not referencing the graph, or its numbers, in his comments. Why would Dr. B. G. Pitre give exaggerated numbers to the SSEHV statistics when a graph (with numbers) was included in the article?

If our guess is true then we have another example when facts are sacrificed for the sake of an image and myth. I think this is a completely wrong model for value education and educators. But this can be easily justified by Sathya Sai Baba's devotees, as their guru, who proclaims himself an Avatar, repeatedly hammers into his devotees' mind: "Past is past, forget the past" (see for example discourse 18.02.2004). That is a very comfortable approach which lets them pretend there were no bloody murders in Sathya Sai Baba's bedroom in 1993, no sexual molestations of young male devotees, no fake lingam productions and materialisations, no unfulfilled promises and so on.

My Response: Serguei Badaev got it right when he called it "our guess". That is exactly what this is: a guess. And a poorly referenced, substantiated and a four and a half year overdue "guess". Serguei wrote another article (8 days after writing this one) in which he went back a little over five years. Desperation, clear and simple.

Click Here to read my comments about the 1993 murders. Click Here to read about my comments regarding those who have allegedly been sexually abused. Click Here to read about my articles on Robert Priddy and his many acknowledgments that Sathya Sai Baba has genuine paranormal powers. Despite this admission from Robert Priddy, he (like Serguei Badaev) believes that Sathya Sai Baba fakes all his alleged miracles (likes lingams, vibuthi, etc.).