Bhopal: Niranjani Akhara on Saturday sacked Mahamandaleshwar Swami Vairagyanand for organising ‘Yajna’ and ‘Anusthan’ for Bhopal Congress candidate Digvijaya Singh during the Lok Sabha campaign. “There is no doubt that Vairagyanand is a true sage but it is not a duty of a sage to favour one person and pray to defeat another. He has been sacked from the party as we had warned him to stop his activities in favour Digvijay Singh. Sadhus should work for the growth and prosperity of the nation,” Akhil Bharatiya Parishad president Mahant Narendra Giri said while speaking to ANI in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh.
“As Vairagyanand continued with his ‘havana’ to defeat Pragya Thakur, he has been removed from the post of Mahamandaleshwar of Panchayati Akhara of Niranjani Dal. The issue will be discussed further in the meeting of Nirajani Akhara board committee,” he said. A Hindu seer, Vairagyanand, had conducted a unique “havan” with five kgs of red chilli for a week for the defeat of BJP’s candidate from Bhopal Sadhvi Pragya, who was at loggerhead with Singh in the concluded elections. Unfortunately, the seer failed in his attempt as Malegaon blast accused Thakur won her first ever Lok Sabha elections by a margin of 3,64,822 lakh votes.
She had won a total of 8,66,482 votes in the constituency. Vairagyanand, associated with Panchayati Niranjani Akhara (followers of Lord Shiva and Vishnu), had claimed to ensure Singh’s victory in the elections by organising “Yajna”. He had announced a rally of at least 20,000 sages in the city in favour of the Congress leader. “I will organise a parade of 20,000 sages in Bhopal in Singh’s support to disperse the misimpression that only BJP has a following of great sadhus and saints,” he had said. The seer had also claimed to take ‘Samadhi’ if Singh loses in the polls.
Undoubtedly, his dramatic entry into the political sphere gave a new dimension to election campaigning in Bhopal. Not only Vairagyanand but Namdas Tyagi, popularly known as Computer Baba, had organised a three-day ‘maha yagna’ along with Singh and other saints here. Later, an FIR was filed against Computer Baba, alleging that he was fanning communal sentiments while campaigning for Singh. When BJP leader and former Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Shivraj Singh Chouhan was in power, Vairagyanand had tried his best to overthrow him with the help of supernatural power of sages. He had also accused Chouhan of making efforts to “buy” saints by offering ministerial status to their leader.