Testimonial letter from Sw Vinod Bharti
This letter is one of a remarkable series of over 2650 letters amassed in 1983 to support Osho's attempt to get permanent resident status in the US at the time of the Oregon ranch. The image is reproduced here with the kind permission of The Oregon Historical Society. Information about their collection of these letters and other supporting material -- the "Jeffrey Noles Rajneesh Collection", named for Osho's immigration lawyer Jeffrey Noles, who compiled them in 1983 and donated them to the OHS -- can be found at this page. The wiki is grateful to the OHS for making access available for these documents. For more information and links to all the letters, see Testimonial letters.
This letter is from Sw Vinod Bharti (Vinod Khanna). It is "Exhibit A-718" in the Noles collection.
The text version below has been created by optical character recognition (OCR), from the images supplied by OHS. It has not been checked for errors but this process usually results in over 99% correct transcription. Most apparent "errors" are correct transcriptions of typos already in the original. The image on the right in the text box links to a pdf file of the original letter, it has 2 pages.
 New York TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN I have been a major film star in India since the last ten years. I got my Int. Commerce Degree from the Sydenham College of Commerce and Economics, Bombay in 1965. I started my film career in 1967 and since then have acted in over 75 major feature length films, most of which had me starring in the leading man's role. The films I worked in are screened all over the world, to Indian, African, Middle-eastern and a few European audiences. Many of the films I have starred in have received awards in various categories of film making. Personally I have received awards several times in the "BEST ACTOR", "BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR" categories from various organisations including "Filmfare", and "Film World" (which are the Indian Oscars). A few of my films have also been entered in International Film Festivals. I came to know Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh in 1975 through his books and religious discourses. After reading and listening to him for a few months I plucked up the courage to meet him personally and was initiated as a disciple. I started doing his meditations (I had previously been doing Transcendental Meditation for two years) every day and listened to his discourses regularly. Also I had several darshans with him and it always amazed me how much care, attention and love he gave each one of us. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh has been the source of inspiration for my creativity as an actor. It was not possible for a human being to be so relaxed, so effortless, so alive in all his photographs. I have yet to see another human, with a live audience of a few thousand, face a camera for two hours at a stretch, without losing his spontaneity, poise and grace. Just watching him walking, sitting, speaking, gave me so much insight into myself and my work. His words and gestures are so much in harmony, so total, effortless, spontaneous. His every action is full of awareness and love. Every word he spoke with its proper stress, as if he cared that it reached the listener. Every sentence was complete with the pauses and punctuations it needed. And every time he was different, eg. when he spoke on the Bhagwad Gita, one felt he was Krishna. One could feel from his words and gestures the extasy of Krishna pouring out, the celebration in his eyes, the flute in his hand. Likewise, he became a Zen Master, Taoist Master, a Bhakta, a Jesus etc. I was wonder struck one day when I actually felt what he said about his being a hollow bamboo and allowing the beyond or existence to speak through him. No school, institute or workshop of acting can teach an actor through methods, techniques to portray Bhagwan - the Blessed One. To portray pure being, extasy, bliss, awareness, joy, celebration, love, God, self-realisation, truth, Nirvana. And the irony is that every actor is seeking this through his acting. No actor can act anything outside his own experience. And the only way any actor can portray the Blessed one - can portray his own pure being - is by experiencing it. Bhagwan says we are all Bhagwans but haven’t realised that. Bhagwan is an enlightened master whose presence, whose words, whose look, whose touch, whose silence, inspires my creativity, inspires me to taste, to experience the ultimate actor within me. Bhagwan was preparing us for years so that one day we could sit in his presence in silence. He always said to listen to his words , but also to listen more to the silence from where his words come from. I go to Rajneeshpuram during the festivals, along with thousands of others pouring in from the four corners of the world. I meet old faces, new faces - we look, we laugh, we smile, we cry, we embrace, we share. All the roles and characters we have been conditioned to play since childhood , which we were still unconsciously playing, seem in the distant past and we can relate today with the real role each one of us is to play in this great Leela - the one existence wants us to play. Blessed are we to have listened to his words [signed] |
(Please note: We assume that the above letter is still copyrighted, but we regard its historical interest to constitute a Fair Use exception for publication in this wiki.)
