The Hindu : Karnataka News : Here, prisoners have become healers

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Nov 02, 2007
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Karnataka

Karnataka

Here, prisoners have become healers

Shankar Bennur

An initiative of the Pranic Healers’ Association of Mysore is paying rich dividends

Healthy living: A prisoner explaining the concepts of pranic healing to others at Mysore Central Prison.

MYSORE: A group of prisoners in Mysore Central Prison get an SOS from the prison authorities and fellow prisoners when someone in the prison suffers from ailment or falls sick and needs “first aid” before a qualified doctor attends to them. The reason: the group consisting of 32 prisoners, including eight women, have turned into pranic healers.

Thanks to the service project of Pranic Healers’ Association of Mysore, the enthusiastic prisoners have transformed themselves into effective energy healers and are now treating several fellow prisoners for minor and long-standing physical problems, improving their overall health and well-being.

Pranic healing is an energy healing technique based on the overall structure of the human body.

The treatment is generally done along with playing audio cassette of “Twin Heart” meditation in the background to increase the efficacy of healing.

The trainers here observed that the meditation practices had a positive impact on the prisoners since they mellowed down which helped in understanding the concept of pranic healing successfully.

Within a short span of time, the healers at the prison mastered the concept and treated several fellow prisoners, which amazed the trainers.

Achievements

The healers’ achievements are many.

They treated the swollen legs of 63-year-old Pillanaiah, a paralytic patient; reduced the frequency of seizures (fits) and headache of 27-year-old Madhusudan; treated piles problem of 35-year-old Siddaiah; treated allergy and boils on the legs of 36-year-old Andania and the list goes on.

In fact, a healer is himself treating his back problem arising out slipped disc.

According to the association, tens of prisoners who had backache, headache, joint pains, fever, cold, stomach ache and many other minor health problems are getting well.

Says pranic healer J.S. Nagaraja: “We did an introductory course on pranic healing in the prison. After this, many prisoners came forward to undergo a basic course in healing which they successfully completed. We gave them certificates from the Meditation and Pranic Healing Centre.”

The course has improved their overall perspective too. Narrating the outcome of their initiative, Prof. Nagaraja said: “A woman prisoner, who is qualified, said she was sitting alone and brooding for hours weeping before learning pranic healing. Now she has to heal many people in the prison and she is hardly gets depressed.”

Noticing the change in the prisoners’ attitude, the prison authorities have asked the association to take up another session of the course so that other prisoners could make use of the technique.

Deputy Superintendent of Prisons Anita, who is a qualified dentist, said: “I was highly sceptic of the efficacy of the technique when it was introduced in the prison. However, as days went by, I saw improvements in the condition of patients and healers. So far, I believed that medicines could cure toothache. Now, I witnessed in the women’s barracks when a child began to weep because of toothache, a healer applied pranic healing and within minutes the child slept.”

The officer feels that there is a need for such healing and meditation courses in the prisons.

Pranic healing helps prisoners, especially during night, when they get distressed or suffer from some pain, and the authorities find it hard to get immediate medical assistance.

“If there are pranic healers sleeping in the same room, they can apply healing as first aid until medical attention can be got during the day,” the trainers argued.

Prof. Nagaraja told The Hindu that pranic healing was easy to learn and when practised diligently could cure people of their ailments. “This has been shown by prisoners who are neither qualified nor have deep medical knowledge. Pranic healing is common man’s answer to the difficulties posed by the modern health care systems,” he said.

Prof. Nagaraja and Vaibhav, Mahadevaswamy and Annapurna, healers, were the trainers.

They are shortly conducting another session in the prison. Mr. Vaibhav visits the prison twice a week to provide guidance and supports the healers.

Prison Superintendent Mallikarjunaswamy has shown interest in organising more courses in the prison, they said, expressing their gratitude to then Jail Superintendent Vishwanathaiah who allowed them to start the course.

The association has decided to focus its activities on college hostels, orphanages, philanthropic institutions and Stree Shakthi Sanghas to popularise pranic healing.

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