When Nicolas Maduro was brought to the court, he invoked God in a New York courtroom this week, which sounded like a familiar political plea. He said, “In the name of God, you will see that I will be free,” and “I am a man of God.”
Behind the fallen Venezuelan strongman’s courtroom theatrics lies an unlikely spiritual devotion — not to Rome, but to an Indian guru revered by millions as a “man of miracles.”
Maduro, who was born Catholic in a Catholic-majority nation, was among prominent Venezuelan politicians described as devotees of the late Indian guru Sri Sathya Sai Baba. Others included Maduro’s wife, Cilia Flores, a former president of the country’s National Assembly, and acting President Delcy Rodriguez.
Sai Baba, known as a “man of miracles” with tens of millions of followers worldwide, was believed by devotees to have abilities ranging from healing the sick to materialising objects seemingly out of nowhere. Visitors to Maduro’s private office in Miraflores Palace in Caracas would have seen a large framed portrait of Sai Baba alongside those of former leaders Hugo Chávez and Simón Bolívar.
Maduro reportedly became an ardent follower of the fuzzy-haired Sai Baba through his wife Cilia Flores, a lawyer and lawmaker in her own right, who was a devotee long before she married Maduro.
It was Flores who brought Maduro to India long before they got married to meet Sai Baba in 2005, when she was a lawyer for former President Hugo Chavez and Maduro was speaker of the Assembly. Flores eventually replaced Maduro as the speaker when he was appointed foreign minister.
A 2005 photograph showed Maduro and Flores, who was the first of the duo to follow Sai Baba, kneeling on the floor during a visit with the guru at his Prasanthi Nilayam Ashram in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh, India. Several photos and videos showed Rodriguez at the ashram in 2023 and 2024, bowing in respect to the spiritual leader.
When Sai Baba died in 2011 at age 84, Maduro had the Venezuelan government issue an official condolence resolution and declare a national day of mourning. On Sai Baba’s birthday in November 2025, just weeks before the collapse of Maduro’s regime, he issued a public statement, described as one of his last with a nonpolitical message. “I always remember him when we met. … May the wisdom of this great teacher continue to enlighten us,” Maduro said, describing the guru as a “being of light.”
How Sathya Sai Baba become household name in Venezuela?
Sathya Sai Baba, born Sathyanarayana Raju in 1926, was reportedly 14 years old when he announced to his parents that he was the reincarnation of the revered 19th-century Hindu and Muslim saint Shirdi Sai Baba. Often recognised by his curly hair, Sathya Sai Baba preached “love all, serve all,” “help ever, hurt never” and similar messages that pointed to service, or seva, as central to spiritual growth. His message extended beyond religious affiliation, and he was followed by people of all backgrounds who used bhajans, chants and psalms in their weekly worship. The widely used logo for Sai Baba and his organisations contained the symbols of five major religions.
Sai Baba was also accused of sexual misconduct by several young male devotees, as reported in a 2006 BBC documentary. In 1993, six young male devotees were allegedly killed by police in Sai Baba’s bedroom, in a highly speculative case where the police claimed they shot in self-defence.
The Sri Sathya Sai International Organisation operated several foundations, trusts and charities in more than 120 countries, providing humanitarian relief through free hospitals, schools, ashrams, universities and clean drinking-water projects, according to the organisation's website. There were almost 2,000 Sathya Sai Centers worldwide. In the Americas, the organisation had an official presence in 22 Latin American countries, and many pointed to Venezuela as having the highest concentration of followers. More than 30 small groups or official centres were located in Venezuela, with devotees from the Andes Mountains to within Amazonian tribes at the southernmost tip. Official organisational talks and meetings were regularly conducted in Spanish, and a devotional song titled “Mi Destino” was introduced by a Sri Sathya youth group in Venezuela in 2016.
The first, unofficial Sai Center opened in Caracas in 1974. In 1988, Ana Elena Diaz-Viana was elected the centre’s inaugural president. Diaz-Viana said many devotees, including herself, encountered spiritual miracles that drew them to Sai Baba. She told RNS she saw a man in white robes and a “big afro” in a dream when she was 25 and then recognised him in a documentary called “The Lost Years of Jesus” five years later.
In 1988, Diaz-Viana joined a group of 64 Venezuelans to meet Sai Baba at the ashram. She said she wrote a letter asking him to help the poor of the country and watched as a red light gleamed under his hand as he materialised a lingam, or a symbol of divine energy, in the palm of his hand. She said he walked to her and gave her the lingam, telling her to wash it and “give the water to the poor people of Venezuela who do not have money to buy medicines and for those who are going to die.”
West inclined towards spiritual Guru
This is not new in Western countries. In West, there are several spiritual Gurus or leaders who have a strong followers list. In the late 1960s and 1970s, a parade of gurus burst on the scene, attracting mainly young seekers. Represent a variety of lineages and emphasizing different aspects of dharmic teachings, they included Swamis Satchidananda, Vishnudevananda, Muktananda and Rama, plus Srila Prabhupada, Bhagwan Sree Rajneesh (aka Osho), B.K.S. Iyengar, Pattabhi Jois and the most famous of all, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
In addition, certain masters who never came to the West—Ramana Maharshi, Sri Aurobindo and Neem Karoli Baba, to name just three—have nevertheless had a big impact, thanks to individuals who propagated their teachings in America. And gurus continue to come to America, of course; the most popular today being Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and Mata Amritanandamayi (Amma).