Pune One Activities and People

The Advertiser Saturday Review, August 1, 1981: ‘The Ashram is ‘a highly energetic and joyful place with days full of music, dancing and singing, as well as a wide variety of skilled arts and craftswork’.

The Weekend Australian, February 14-15, 1981: ‘There were in the ashram twenty-three doctors, a fair number of dentists, plumbers, painters, mechanics of all kinds, carpenters , printers, interior decorators, chefs, bookbinders, tailors, and even soap-makers. The ashram had its own fully staffed hospital, workshops, canteen, post-office and general store. Its facilities were spotless in a country where dirt and infection are endemic.’

The Daily, India, June 6, 1981: ‘The sannyasins were some of the most brilliant people from all over the world. There were members from the Royal Dramatic Academy, leading figures from the world of art, cinema and music, and even some technologists from the highly sophisticated West. The Rajneesh group had class, whatever people from Poona may say. They brought glitter, glamour and grace to this town in their own kinky way. The Rajneesh Ashram had some of the best talent under one roof any institution could boast of. The Rajneesh Theater groups brought some of the best dramatic arts to the Bombay stage. Their musical members had a better grasp of modern Western music, especially jazz and blues. Among some of the more creative arts, the Rajneesh Ashram had some of the best horticulturists and hydroponic experts. Soaps and other toiletry articles were being made too, at the ashram workshops.’

The Times, London, April 10, 1980: ‘The workshops are extensive and impressive; these are no fumbling amateurs messing about with batik and linocuts, but serious craftsmen turning out furniture, metal-ware, silver inlaying, screen-printing and the like, of high quality. But the point is that almost all of them started without any skill at these trades. The further point is that they are all obviously happy in their work. I have heard the sannyasins’ temporary sojourn at the ashram (many come for a month or so at a time, often using their annual leave for the purpose) described as a holiday; if so, it is a holiday with remarkable therapeutic qualities, for I met no one who did not testify to the gains the experience had brought, and none who lacked the visible sign of such gains’.