Kriyananda - Recent Years

Recent Years

Kriyananda married in 1981, and publicly renounced his monastic vows on the occasion of his second marriage in 1985. He was later divorced. In 1995, on his own, he officially resumed his monastic vows and title. According to Yogananda in his first edition of his Autobiography in reference to the ancient swami order, “because it is a formal order… no one can give himself the title of swami.”

From 1996, Kriyananda lived and taught for seven years at the Ananda Italy center, near Assisi.

In 2003, he moved to India, where he began an Ananda center in Gurgaon, near Delhi. For five years (until May 1, 2009) he appeared daily on Aastha TV, a cable station that is broadcast throughout India, Asia, Europe, and the U.S. Since Kriyananda's 2003 move to India, Ananda teachers have been giving classes on meditation and Kriyā Yoga in many major Indian cities. In 2009, at age 83, Kriyānanda moved to Pune, India, to start a new community.

In 2009 Kriyananda established a new Swami order, which is completely different from the ancient swami order that Yogananda is a part of. According to Kriyananda, in this new age (Dwapara Yuga) not all old patterns remain valid. Some reformation is necessary. Some of the features of the newly formed Swami order are: 1) Swamis can be single or married. 2) They can be freely creative, if the purpose is to serve others. 3) A new Swami is named not by one Swami (which has been the tradition), but by three. 4) A Swami of this new order is called "Nayaswami", with "naya" meaning "new".