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Sheela, who was born Sheela Ambalal Patel to a Gujarati

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Press Trust of India
family in Baroda in 1949, says she loved Osho and trusted him implicitly and blindly. "I've a deep and abiding respect for his teachings and remain his loving devotee even to this day." She feels Osho was robbed by his own people. "And today his sannyasins (devotees) are too frightened and ashamed to talk about Rajneeshpuram. In my opinion, his people diminish him by not talking about this most important time of his life." Writing about his death, Sheela says she finds it difficult even today to believe that it was natural. Osho died of heart failure in 1989 at the age of 58. "Even today, I do not accept that it was a natural death. If it was natural, I would have certainly felt it," Sheela claims. The first few chapters of the book deal with the period immediately following the author's departure from Rajneeshpuram and the beginning of the legal process against her in the wake of allegations of wrongdoings against her. In the second part of the book, Sheela picks up the thread from the beginning when she joined Osho's movement around 1972 at the age of 20.

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First Published: Feb 20 2013 | 1:30 PM IST

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