Followers of a fugitive Indian Hindu guru on a mission to determine his personal state are popping up throughout Latin America, providing a whole bunch of hundreds of {dollars} to purchase land in Ecuador, Paraguay and now Bolivia.
On the finish of final yr, a consultant of the Baure Indigenous folks within the Bolivian Amazon signed a “perpetual” contract leasing 60,000 hectares (148,260 acres) of their huge rainforest for $108,000 (£81,910) a yr.
A consultant of the Cayubaba Indigenous folks signed an analogous contract, leasing 31,000 hectares for $55,800 yearly.
On the opposite finish of the contracts, the profiteer was the US of Kailasa, which, regardless of presenting itself to the Indigenous peoples as a nation, just isn’t recognised by any nation or the UN.
The fictional nation was created by Nithyananda – a self-anointed “godman” and the “supreme pontiff of Hinduism” – in 2019, after he fled India whereas dealing with costs of abducting kids for his ashram and one in every of raping a follower.
After failed makes an attempt to purchase land in Ecuador and Paraguay – and even signing an settlement with the US metropolis of Newark, which was later scrapped when officers realised Kailasa didn’t exist – the pretend nation turned to Bolivia.
Between September and November 2024, its representatives signed contracts with not less than 4 Indigenous teams for the 1,000-year lease “with automated and perpetual renewal” of their lands.
Every part appeared to go in line with plan till the Bolivian newspaper El Deber uncovered it final month.
“After I first learn the contracts, I assumed, ‘I have to be imagining this’. They have been so irrational that it felt like magical realism,” mentioned Silvana Vicenti, the journalist who broke the story.
In accordance with the contracts, seen by the Guardian, Kailasa would management huge swathes of land, “with full sovereignty and autonomy” inside every Indigenous territory together with rights over the airspace and all pure assets above or beneath the bottom.
The Indigenous teams could be obliged to “defend Kailasa in any authorized proceedings” and assist its recognition “as a sovereign and impartial state, shield it in opposition to aggression, and again its admission to worldwide organisations such because the UN”.
For Vicenti, it appeared like “a monarchy with Indigenous topics”.
Jhovana Morales, a lawyer from Fundación Tierra, an NGO that works on Indigenous land points, mentioned the contracts have been abusive and violated a number of Bolivian legal guidelines. One instance was the perpetual lease clause, because the civil code units a most time period of 10 years.
“The contracts are a complete rip-off,” mentioned Morales. “However the strangest half is that, to at the present time, nobody is aware of precisely what occurred. First, how did they get in? … How did they attain these locations and begin instantly approaching sectors of Indigenous Amazonian territory?”
The Bolivian authorities has but to offer all of the solutions.
After the case broke, it issued a press release denying diplomatic ties with the fictional nation.
A photograph of the Bolivian president, Luis Arce, smiling as he receives a e book entitled United States of Kailasa from a girl sporting a saffron-coloured sari has begun circulating.
Though Arce has not commented, his nationwide director of migration, Katherine Calderón, mentioned the lady had requested an image with the president throughout an occasion – hosted by an Indigenous confederation in October – “as is frequent at any public gathering”.
On 24 March, Calderón introduced that Bolivia had expelled 20 foreigners “linked” to Kailasa – of various nationalities, together with Indian, British, American and Chinese language – who had entered the nation as vacationers however have been searching for to “acquire land” in Indigenous territories.
Specialists resembling Morales have criticised the choice, saying the federal government ought to have accomplished its investigation earlier than expelling those that might have been concerned.
Bolivian journalist associations issued a joint assertion denouncing threats reporters had acquired “from representatives of the self-proclaimed state of Kailasa” since they started overlaying the case.
Nithyananda, whose whereabouts stays unknown, gave a “reside presidential deal with” on social media final Wednesday to dispel “malicious rumours” allegedly unfold by “anti-Hindu media retailers” claiming he was useless.
He didn’t point out Bolivia instantly, however his YouTube channel has revealed movies the place his followers admit to signing the lease agreements and declare they sought to “assist environmental safety … and [provide] humanitarian support” to the Indigenous communities.
The Guardian despatched a listing of inquiries to the Bolivian authorities and Kailasa’s “workplace of worldwide relations” however has not acquired a response.
The Multi-ethnic Indigenous Territory II organisation, which incorporates the Ese Ejja individuals who signed the contract, issued a press release that mentioned Kailasa had “manipulated” a few of its representatives and brought “benefit of their vulnerability to extract a signature with the promise of simple cash”.
The group added: “Our territory just isn’t on the market, it’s not for hire, and it’s not topic to any type of negotiation. Our land is the legacy of generations who’ve cared for and defended it with blood and resistance.”
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