New cult offers nirvana at a price
The Times of India
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2002
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?artid=28895869

NEW DELHI: Tucked away in a quiet corner of Defence Colony, the Delhi headquarters of the Church of Scientology is surprisingly nondescript.

So low-key have scientologists been that the entry of the world's "newest religion" in India, that has among its followers Hollywood heavyweights Tom Cruise, John Travolta and Kirstie Alley, has gone almost unnoticed.

Founded by one-time sci-fi author, the late L Ron Hubbard, in 1954, the Church now claims eight million followers worldwide. Controversy has dogged the Church and its maverick philosopher-founder almost since inception.

Reports of it being a "closed, fanatical cult" have appeared time and again in the media. A critical cover story in Time magazine (May 6, 1991) called it "the most lucrative and litigious cult the country (US) has ever seen".

A visit to the Delhi scientology centre, however, leaves one with the feeling that in India a concerted effort is being made to leave the troubled, scandalous past behind. For one, the centre is called the "Hubbard Dianetics Foundation" and not the Church of Scientology. Says Joss Van De Ven, a senior Dutch scientologist who is managing the centre:

"We are offering something that is practical and workable."

Nirvana, however, is anything but instant in scientology. The novitiate is separated from the dianetical equivalent of enlightenment by a series of levels that he must pass, either by enrolling in more courses, or by getting repeatedly audited.

And there lies the catch, for the courses are prohibitively expensive.

Even at the Delhi centre, that offers only elementary ones, the cost is anything from Rs 2,000 to Rs 9,000 per course, even after a self-confessed "lowering" to meet India's impoverished standards. The monetary factor ensures that scientology's clientele in India is strictly upper class.

In fact, reported allegations of making money off adherents is one of the controversies the Church has faced over the years, made worse by claims of Hubbard having once said and quoted in the Reader's Digest (issue May 1980): "Writing for a penny a word is ridiculous. If a man really wants to make a million dollars, the best way would be to start his own religion."

The philosophy

NEW DELHI: According to the cult philosophy of dianetics, destructive emotions are caused by imprints of negative memories on the unconscious mind. These, claimed Hubbard, could be cleared by "auditing" -- a process of selective retrieval and purging of memories.

Joss Van De Van, a Dutch scientologist, explains that dianetics, the philosophy, evolved into scientology, the religion, with late L Ron Hubbard's "discovery of the spirit at the core of every being".

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