Two weeks ago: A local baba’s totka (charm) in Banda, we were told about two weeks ago, was centred on one chant – “Apni bahu beti ki chotiyaan bachaye” – timed perfectly with the phenomenon of women’s braids being mysteriously chopped in their sleep. Responding to an immediate need that had emerged in Bundelkhand – at last count, we had the choti-kaat syndrome in both Mahoba and Banda – and erupted across several states, news had spread in and around Banda of the virtues of a certain godman in that department. “Go there, and make sure the women of your house are safe,” said one to another at the chai shop.

We know of several who did fall, hook, line, and sinker for this and plodded off to get their share of the potion that would ensure their bahu-betiyaan’s izzat stay in place. And when we say izzat, we mean hair, of course.

One week ago: “I only fell for it, I think, because I’d just sat for my exams and I’m desperate for good results.” During lunch, a member of a super-busy video production news desk in Delhi is telling her colleagues an anecdote about a “sant babaji” who had come visiting her home over the weekend. She’d gifted him some flour, as asked, and was about to give cash, when good sense prevailed. “When I asked him if I would pass or fail, he told me I should first arrange for 5 kilos of laddoos. I thought, ‘Where am I going to get 5 kilos of laddoos from?’” She also had one of those “wait a minute…” moments, she confesses.

Few days ago: Siddhishri Baba came visiting Mahoba and started speaking of “darshans (visitations)” in dreams that had empowered him with the wherewithal to distribute “jadi-booti (herbs)” and blessings in general that were apparently healing people. “I feel like 50 per cent of my ailment is gone,” said Narayan, who had heard of the Baba while undergoing treatment in Gwalior to no effect. When we went to report on the miracle, we found that Siddhishri Baba was none other than Halke Ram – whom everyone knew as a local resident, a farmer, until about a week ago. “Yahin bakriyan charate the,” says Jageshwar Kushwaha, Halke Ram’s erstwhile neighbour, “aur phir chamatkaari ho gaye (He used to graze his goats here, and then became a miracle worker).” Kushwaha tells us of the miracles he’s seen up-close, such as a man who couldn’t walk but began performing parikramas (perambulations) within minutes of being blessed or “cured” by Siddhishri Baba. Prod a little and he tells us, poker-faced, that he didn’t really witness this so-called miracle, or any others for that matter. “Sune hain hum (I’ve heard all about it),” he says.

Today: The RJ on Delhi’s popular radio station is on about Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh Insaan’s “good behaviour” as an inmate – information that is news in almost every channel and newspaper of the day. The RJ cannot seem to get enough of his daily diet – 7 rotis per meal – but more importantly, he is also offering his army of listeners some strangely incredulous opinions. “We know that what he did was bad, but if a man is repenting, and doing some good deeds, we must appreciate and acknowledge them,” he says, right before playing the song of the month.

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So, what is it about babas then? Why do people go to them? And what about the support they manage to inspire?

These questions may have emerged on the media’s radar with the sentencing of Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim on August 28, but for us, they are not new.

We have been covering stories about the sexual escapades of self-declared godmen in Chitrakoot, Barabanki, Mahoba, and other small towns in Uttar Pradesh for years.

Take the case of Baba Qutubadeen, for instance, who’d been teaching Arabic to the local children in the Bargad kasbah of Chitrakoot. Running the madarsa for over seven years, he went missing overnight, when a girl accused him misbehaving with her. By the next afternoon, several other girls had come out with similar stories which they’d been withholding for long, some for years. The girl, who gathered courage to tell her parents, told us how the Baba had made the girls swear on the Quran – that if they complained to their parents, their families would die and their own hands would fall off. She said she thought it was part of education to be felt up and only decided to break her silence when she was told to “undress and lie on the bed”. Several of the girls started missing their classes deliberately, and this was what brought Baba Qutubadeen’s debauchery into sharp focus.

Yet another impediment to the education of girls in rural UP, we thought, which was already as high as 52 per cent of girls who don’t go to school. But this comes as no surprise. Also in Chitrakoot, we heard so many more stories of sexual harassment and debauchery in ashrams and akhadas – women are the prime targets and the repeated victims. For all concerns relating to “women’s health”, babas are like the one-stop shop because they offer multiple services: they are gynaecologists, experts in sex determination, mental health experts, counsellors, you name it.

In a conversation we had recently at our Karwi headquarters, our staff member spoke of how she was sexually harassed by a Baba. But the episode did not stop the family from seeking other godmen; they still do. Their following in small towns and rural areas is massive, made obvious by the fact that nobody wanted to speak ill of these “holy” men even after they had been taken into police custody on charges of sexual harassment and rape.

So we come back to the question again: What is it in these babas that people flock to them? The question evoked many emotions among Khabar Lahariya’s own reporters. “I had gone to one baba in Rehutiya village,” recalls one, and quickly qualifies, “but that was several years ago when I was not very well informed.” But then, she said, she developed “gynaecological issues”, which she couldn’t really discuss with anyone.

Enter babaji. “He gave me a concoction to drink,” she says, and adds, almost sheepishly, “it may have given me temporary relief”. This is a senior team member who was asked just a few days ago when was the last time she visited a baba. “I took my epileptic son a few years ago, but to a different baba,” she says, and adds, “This baba had magical powers. I know of many who were cured by him.” Clearly, the “jaankaari” that empowers our colleague now hasn’t changed beliefs – the daughter who had a leg wound had been taken to a third baba and finally the entire family had visited a famous baba’s ashram in Maharashtra as part of their annual vacation!

And it’s not just ordinary folks like you and me. Political patronage towards babas, both small or big, is as apparent in Bundelkhand as anywhere else. In Chitrakoot, politicians, local administration and businessmen have always sought the blessings of babas and have contributed, quite visibly, to their ashrams and institutes. Thousands flock to these ashrams in the hope of medical treatment, miracles, support and a sense of belonging. When the State fails you in such deliberate ways, and in such necessary areas, where do you look but heaven-ward? If a “saintly soul” is waving you there – most likely to his abode/dera/ashram/what-have-you – and showing you the way – most likely to a box marked donations – rest assured, you’re walking right along. If that makes you a follower, a bhakt, then that’s what it makes you. Because there’s a lot to be said for medical aid, access to and availability of medicines, all you can eat buffets. A chance at an education. The all-encompassing answer to an apathetic sarkar can only, after all, be a few blessings. The fact that this can be bestowed by a self-styled entrepreneur, sorry, guru, is as natural as the turn of the tide then. As is the fact that it can be leveraged to all sorts of advantages for him personally – financial, sexual, all laced with a good dose of fame and power.

But if it’s hard to be dismissive of babas when religion and the caste system have failed to live upto people’s expectations, it’s perhaps equally hard – if not harder – to be critical of godmen.

Another Khabar Lahariya reporter told us point-blank she was deeply against godmen of all kinds. They brought back her nightmares about her mother’s condition. She told us how, growing up, she would be witness to her mother “being suddenly possessed” and quite often at that. The entire household would have to watch as one baba after another would visit, come inside the home and whip the lady with leather belts and whips until she passed out. When she would revive, she would be back to her “normal state”, the reporter tells us adding how she, along with her three sisters, would often run and hide in neighbours’ houses until this entire process was done with and her mother temporarily cured. Of what? In hindsight, she calls it by its name: Epilepsy.

But the story doesn’t end there.

A local hermit had told her family that they could be blessed with a male child – since there were four daughters, this was an obvious, dire need of the family – if our reporter’s mother would go stay with him and sleep with him. Conceiving a male child was part of his package deal, it seems. Since this was not acceptable to her parents, they all returned, but she remembers, with a feeling of great disappointment. The entire family eventually gave up their beliefs in the Hindu religion and adopted a sect that claims to be egalitarian in nature. The sect has a large following and according to the reporter, people are encouraged to stop all spending on religious practices and rituals. They are also made to touch each other’s feet since everyone, regardless of their caste, religion, gender and class, is considered equal. This is a Dalit family and they finally feel a sense of security, she affirms – they feel that they are part of a larger collective with members ranging from across the spectrum, “from Bundelkhand to Bangalore”.

She does however feel a sense of loss – “We don’t light diyas during Diwali,” she says, and adds, “Actually, we don’t celebrate anything at all.” A firm disbeliever in all things baba, she feels that people should be free to believe in and practice things that give them happiness. But then that could also include babas, we ask? “Well, maybe those whose miracles are not entirely baseless,” she says finally, trying hard to sound rational!

What is it about babas and their bootis then?

It’s a complicated affair – mired with and moored in a lack so severe it is perhaps only natural. Because aren’t we are all suckers for divine succour?

Khabar Lahariya is a rural, video-first digital news organisation, with an all-women network of reporters in 8 districts of Uttar Pradesh.