Mahmud of Ghazni destroyed thousands of temples during his raids including the Somnath temple in 1025 AD, killing over 50000 people who tried to defend it. In the early years of British penetration in India, there was an uprising of the saints termed as the Sanyasi Revolt. British fearing the power of these men in saffron and knowing that they would not be able to establish their rule in India till these people are suppressed, killed 150 saints.

In present times, the term ‘saffronisation’ has been coined by negative, asuric forces to uproot the vedic culture and undermine the saints. Corrupt so-called saints are highlighted in the media repeatedly to pull down the image of saffron, while hardly ever is a saint working for animals or people or environment brought to fore. Our country is known to produce saints like Ramkrishna Paramhans, Ramana Maharishi and their modern counterparts, but no one talks about them. No one even talks about so-called saints from any other community, when many are known to have committed crimes against humanity. I wonder why only specific few are handpicked by the media.

In such times it becomes our prime duty to uphold saffron, by understanding what it is all about, by understanding the vedas and what they talk about and not a myopic opinion based on a minority highlighted in the media.

—Yogi Ashwini is the Guiding Light of Dhyan Foundation and can be reached at www.dhyanfoundation.com