Thousands of Sri Satya Sai devotees and the local people of Puttaparthy are up in arms against the Satya Sai Central Trust members for driving a wedge between them and the God man Sri Sai Baba.

Popular Telugu daily Andhra Jyothy, in a series of special stories in the last two days, said that the local people are very angry with the Trust members, especially its secretary Mr K. Chakravarthi.

Chakravarthi, an IAS officer belonging to Tamil Nadu, became very close to Baba when he worked as the District Collector of Ananthapuram district and took up the post of the Registrar of the Satya Sai Institute of Higher Learning in 1981 after quitting his service. Then, within no time, he became the secretary of the Trust.

After he took control of the Trust, he imposed several restrictions on the movement of devotees and also on the movements of Baba, the daily says.

The daily quoted the locals and devotees as saying that the Baba used to talk to the washer men also with love and affection. “They used to go to the Baba room directly and collect his clothes for washing before Chakravarthi took over the Trust administration,” Andhra Jyothy said quoting locals.

Some locals said that whenever there was a problem in the village, Baba’s brother Janakiramaiah used to take the villagers to the Baba and solve the issue instantly. “Baba was also voluntarily responding to the news paper reports and he used to offer assistance to the locals and people of the surrounding areas in finding solutions to their problems,” the daily said quoting the villagers.

After the death of Janakiramaiah, Chakravarthi’s control of the Trust became complete. Janakiramaiah’s son Mr Ratnakar was made a member of the Trust but he wielded no influence in the Trust. “Chakravarthi saw to it that the domination of the Tamil officials grew in the Prashanthi Nilayam,” the paper said.

The paper said that the situation has changed completely with the entry of Chakravarthy into the Prashanthi Nilayam. “News papers stopped going to the Baba room and the local washer men were not allowed to go in to the Baba room which was the usual practice earlier,” the paper said.

“Even VVIPs like chief ministers, governors and foreign dignitaries of other countries were also made to wait for several hours when they came for a Darshan of the Baba,” the paper said, adding that the daily Darshan of the Baba was even restricted to the normal devotees after he took over the administration.

Recollecting Chakravarthi’s behaviour, the local people are now very angry with him for not speaking directly on the health condition of the Baba now.

As a precautionary measure, he was given security by the district police.