Bolivia deports Nithyananda followers

Bolivia recently arrested and deported 20-odd people associated with the nonexistent country 'United States of Kailasa' - 'founded' by fugitive godman Nithyananda, who had fled India in 2019 after being accused of rape, torture and child abuse - accusing them of "land trafficking" after they negotiated 1,000-year leases with indigenous groups for swaths of the Amazon three times the size of New Delhi. Officials said the deals were declared void, and the 'Kailasans' were deported - to their actual home countries, among them India & the US.

'Kailasa' did not respond to requests for comment.

Scandal erupted after a Bolivian newspaper exposed the leases. A leader of the Baure, one of the groups, said its contact with 'Kailasa' emissaries began late last year, when they arrived offering help after forest fires. Subsequently, land leases were proposed and the Baure agreed to a 25-year deal that would supposedly have paid them nearly $200,000 annually. But when 'Kailasa' representatives came back with a draft in English, it covered 1,000 years and included use of airspace and extraction of natural resources. Bolivia has declared the deals void.