Bikram Choudhury is a yoga guru who claims to inspire as he helps heal the mind and body, although his critics say he is something else. They believe that he manipulates the young and vulnerable. He now faces six separate civil lawsuits who accuse him of raping them.

“The one common thread to all their complaints is the betrayal of trust,” said attorney Mary Shea, who is representing the women. “It’s human nature. People are always looking for spiritual leaders. When you have traditional churches failing and people are looking for spiritual guidance, it is not suprising that people go to other arenas,” Shea told CNN. “He told them he is on the same level as Buddha and Jesus Christ.”

Choudhury is not facing any criminal charges and pleaded he did not do anything. In a strong statement, the lawyers defending Choudhury has said the accusations were “lurid” and that they were to “exploit the legal system for financial gain.”

“The women did not independently come forward to tell their stories sexual assault after years of keeping them a secret. Instead, they signed on to become plaintiffs in these cases following a world-wide and lengthy period of socialization through letters and social media seeking to convince women to sue Mr. Choudhury,” the statement said.

Choudhury is the founder of Bikram’s Yoga college of India. He’s featured prominently on its website, which details his system of preforming 26 yoga poses. The organization offers teacher training, which is where Choudhury allegedly met and groomed the women.

The most recent lawsuit is from Jill Lawler who said she fell in love with the program basically from her first class. She had apparently begged her parents for money from her college fund, to attend the nine-week teacher training course. She had started in April 2010, soon after the alleged abuse had begun.

According to the lawsuit, it began with the married Choudhury trying to put his hand inside Lawler’s pants, eventually escalating to rape, which continued for years. “She was ashamed, and embarrassed. She did not think that anyone would believe her, and she was afraid that if defendant Bikram Choudhury heard that she had told, that he would kick her out of training and she would have lost both the $10,000 from her college fund, and her ability to work as a yoga instructor in order to pay for college,” the suit reads.

FSA Questions

1. What is the main idea of the story?
2. Select the best 2 sentences from the story to support the main idea.
3. What is the meaning of the word manipulated?
4. What is the purpose of this story?
5. What was the authors purpose of writing this article?