Baba Ramdev or Swami Ramdev is one of India's prominent spiritual gurus who is hailed not only for dedicated efforts towards popularising Yoga but also for taking up initiatives of socio-political importance.
Born in 1953 as Ramkishan Yadav, he suffered from paralysis in the childhood. It was, in fact, with Yoga that Baba Ramdev was able to turn all his body parts functional.
He dropped out of school after eight standard to join a gorukul in Khanpur village where he learned Sanskrit and Yoga and eventually assumed Sanyas, taking his present name.
He later moved to Jind district where he joined the aarsh gurukul Kalba. Here started offering free Yoga training to villagers across Haryana. With this concept of free yoga Baba Ramdev won the hearts and trust of millions.
Along with Acharya Karamveer, a scholar in Yog and Veda and Acharya Balkrishna, an Ayurvedic physican, Baba Ramdev established the Divya Yog Mandir Trust in 1995.
The trust was set up with an aim of popularizing Yoga along with offering Ayurvedic treatments.
It was the 'Om Yog Sadhana' program on Zee Jagran which made Baba Ramdev popular as well as made it possible for him to attract millions of followers across the world as the show is broadcast in continents including Africa, Australia, Asia, Europe and America.
Swamiji's Yoga lessons got so famous that he was even invited to conduct a Yog camp at the Rashtrapati Bhavan (President's residence).
Ramdev also set new trend by going against the usual path of laying emphasis on asanas or the yog postures and embraced Pranayama (breathing exercises).
News on Baba RamdevWhile the followers of Ramdev have claimed that the they experience relief from various ailments, the Swami is given credit for single-handedly popularising Yoga when it was at the verge of disappearance from being widely practiced.
Through his
Bharat Swabhiman Andolan, Ramdev also raised concern over national issues such as malpractices in the agricultural sector, exploitation of farmers, poor condition of indigenous industries, country's black money stashed in Swiss banks, population living with minimum wages and consumption of fast food and soft drinks.
As any other prominent social figure Baba Ramdev too was involved in some controversies.
In 2006, CPI(M) leader Brinda Karat alleged that the Ramdev's Divya Yog Mandir Trust Pharmacy was using human and animal bones in their medicines. This was later dismissed and Ramdev only gained from the controversy as Trust's ayurvedic medicines sales have grew immensely after the controversy.
After Delhi High Court passed an order in 2009 decriminalizing homosexuality, Ramdev yet again shot up in the negative light when he expressed his
opposition to Homosexuality. He even termed homosexuals as 'sick people' and said they should be treated for it.
Baba Ramdev also created quiet a stir twice when he claimed that AIDS and Cancer could be cured by Yoga.
In 2010, Ramdev took up the mission to save India from corruption and decided to float his own political party called Bharat Swabhiman.
He, however, said that he will not contest in elections but will field candidates from his party in all 543 Lok Sabha seats so that in the span of few years, he can 'cleanse' the country off dishonest politicians.
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