Osho Movement

Osho Movement

The Rajneesh movement is a term used by Hugh B. Urban and other commentators to refer collectively to persons inspired by the Indian mystic Osho (formerly known as Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, 1931–1990), particularly initiated disciples who are referred to as "neo-sannyasins" or simply "sannyasins." They were also formerly known as Rajneeshees or "Orange People," because of the orange and later red, maroon and pink clothes they used from 1970 until 1985. Members of the movement are also sometimes called Oshoites in the Indian press.

The movement was controversial in the 1970s and 1980s, due to the founder's hostility to traditional values, first in India and later in the United States of America. In the USSR the movement was banned as being contrary to "positive aspects of Indian culture and to the aims of the youth protest movement in Western countries". These "positive aspects" were seen as being subverted by Osho, who was portrayed as a reactionary religious ideologist of the monopolistic bourgeoisie of India, promoting the ideas of the consumer society in a traditional Hindu guise.

In Oregon the movement's large intentional community of the early 1980s, called Rajneeshpuram, caused immediate tensions in nearby towns such as The Dalles, Oregon, at the peak of which a circle of leading members of the Rajneeshpuram Oregon commune was arrested for crimes including a deliberate food poisoning attack calculated to influence the outcome of a local election. Osho was deported from the United States in 1985 for immigration violations and the movement's headquarters eventually returned to Poona (present-day Pune), India.

The movement in India gradually received a more positive response from the surrounding society, especially after the founder's death in 1990. The Osho International Foundation (OIF) is presently managed by an "Inner Circle" set up by Osho before his death. They jointly administer Osho's estate and operate the Osho International Meditation Resort in Pune.

The late 1990s saw rival factions challenging both OIF's copyright holdings over Osho's works and the validity of its royalty claims on publishing or reprinting of materials. In the United States, following a 10-year legal battle with Osho Friends International (OFI), the OIF lost their exclusive rights over the trademark OSHO in January 2009.

There are a number of smaller centres of the movement in India and around the world including the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands.