A new BBC investigation has uncovered allegations of sexual exploitation, grooming and trafficking linked to a yoga movement with followers in the UK.
These shocking allegations, revealed in an investigative podcast series for Radio 4 and BBC Sounds, are linked to the teachings of convicted sex offender and ‘bad guru’ Gregorian Bivolaru.
The 72-year-old Romanian is spiritual guide to thousands of students at yoga schools affiliated to Atman – the International Federation of Yoga and Meditation.
In England, the guru’s followers run a registered charity called Tara Yoga Centre, which has working studios in London, Oxford and Plymouth, and has run classes in Cambridge, Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Leicester, Burton-on-Trent and Woking, as well as in Dublin, in the Republic of Ireland.
Series six of World of Secrets: The Bad Guru is presented by documentary filmmaker Cat McShane.
Oxfordshire University tutor Miranda was looking for a way to mindfully manage life’s challenges, which led to her joining yoga classes at Tara Yoga Centre near Old Street in London in 2017.
After becoming involved in a wider movement of Gregorian Bivolaru’s followers, she says that within two years, she found herself at the centre of an international web of trafficking and sexual exploitation.
Now, seven years on, Miranda is telling her story publicly, on the record, for the first time.
The Tara Yoga Centre is an affiliate of the Atman federation, a UK-registered umbrella organisation which has affiliates in 29 countries.
Atman promotes the teachings of Gregorian Bivolaru, a convicted sex offender who was charged in France in November 2023 with human trafficking, organised kidnapping, rape, and the French criminal offence of organised abuse of weakness by a sect. He is also wanted in Finland on aggravated human trafficking charges.
Miranda talks about how she ended up taking part in sexualised rituals, and was tricked into going to a villa near Prague where she was persuaded to work in a live online pornography business for six months.
She also describes how she and other female followers were driven through Paris blindfolded to meet the fugitive guru at a secret location for a so-called initiation involving prolonged sexual intercourse.
The series has uncovered evidence that some of Tara’s teachers were helping to arrange trips for other students to see the fugitive guru. Miranda’s trip was arranged by two people she met through the school, but not by the school itself.
Miranda says: “I wanted to believe that whatever they were doing, even if it seemed gross to me, and inappropriate and hyper-sexualized, was for some spiritual reason that I couldn’t yet understand.
“The only thing I can do now is to speak about this and to put my reputation and everything else on the line. But I want truth and justice and for people to not be hurt, for things to be different in the future.”
Cat McShane says: “Yoga is the spiritual practice millions swear by – there is an expectation that it’s supposed to be good for you, so you let your guard down.
“The women I met are intelligent women, who quite unremarkably joined a yoga class. But what happened to them is anything but unremarkable.
“Over the last four years, I’ve heard some deeply worrying accounts of coercion and sexual exploitation for profit, after they became involved with one of the affiliates of the Atman federation. It is important that these stories are heard.”
Daniel Clarke, Factual Commissioning Editor at Radio 4 comments: “The idea that yoga studios in towns across the UK can be connected to the kinds of allegations made in this series is truly shocking.
“The Bad Guru takes us into a world that shows us how the promise of salvation and spiritual growth can groom and condition people in truly strange and frightening ways.
“This series follows previous World of Secrets investigations including The Abercrombie Guys, which exposed appalling cases of exploitation and misconduct. This is the kind of international investigation the BBC does best.”
World of Secrets, season six, The Bad Guru is available to listen first on BBC Sounds from today, 9 December.
