They arrested me without any warrant. They did not tell me why I was arrested; their answer was the points of their guns. Whenever a government goes mentally bankrupt, this happens. Then they forced me into jail to sign under a false name, David Washington. I refused. The U.S. Marshal who was telling me to sign under a false name asked me, "Why are you making a fuss about it? You can sleep; I can go to sleep. It is midnight." I said, "I don't care about you and your sleep, but I want to know, What kind of justice is this? You arrest me and you want me to sign under David Washington's name. That means you never arrested me -- because you have no warrant -- and if I sign under David Washington's name, you can kill me and there will be no proof that I ever entered the jail. I will simply disappear into thin air. You write the name of David Washington; fill the form in your own handwriting -- and I will sign." He thought I was willing to sign David Washington, so he filled it in his own handwriting -- and I simply signed my own name. He said, "What are you doing?" I said, "Exactly what should be done. This is my name -- and now you are caught. Tomorrow morning in all the newspapers and on all the televisions and radios the news will be there. You cannot throw away this form. My signature is known all over the world, and it is not easy to copy it.
In the first place it is difficult to understand what it is... You have written everything in your own handwriting -- you are the criminal." The last thing they did -- because they had nothing against me: before the trial the government attorneys came to my attorneys, which is a rare thing. Only the weaker party goes to the stronger party for negotiations. They came to negotiate the case before the trial began; and the negotiations they were proposing... I will tell you exactly how cunning it was. The condition was: "If Osho accepts the guilt on two small counts, then we will allow him to leave the jail. We will allow the judge to release him with only one condition: that he will not be able to enter America for five years. "If you don't accept the terms and you want to fight the case -- although we know and you know that we don't have any case against him -- then we will not allow him to be bailed out. And the case can be prolonged for five years, ten years, fifteen years. We know you will win the case, so we will prolong it as much as possible. And the whole pressure of the government is on it; it is a question of prestige. We don't want to be defeated by a single individual." My attorneys came with tears in their eyes. They were not sannyasins; they were the topmost attorneys in the United States. But in these twelve days while I was in jail they were coming to see me, and by and by something of love, something of respect had already happened.

They would come into the jail and they would say, "We cannot sit on the chair in front of you; it feels strange. Allow us to sit on the floor just the way you allow your sannyasins to sit." They came with tears, and they said, "They have proposed such a thing that we are in a dilemma. We know you are not guilty and we know that you are not going to accept that you are guilty. But they are not going to accept bail at any cost -- ten million dollars, twenty million dollars. They say no; at no cost is it possible to take him on bail. We are afraid that they will kill you, they will torture you, they will harass you. "And they can continue it for years. Your whole movement will be suffering, thousands of sannyasins will be suffering. We have seen: there are many sannyasins who have not eaten anything since you have been in jail. So just think of those sannyasins, the people who love you, and accept on the two minor points." Seeing the whole situation, just for you I have accepted that I am guilty. And you can see the cunningness of the government: they had said that they would simply release me and keep me out of America for five years, but once I accepted the guilt, the judge immediately gave the fine of four hundred thousand dollars -- and five years of no entry to America. These four hundred thousand dollars were not part of the negotiations, but the judge was not part of the negotiations either -- although he knew exactly on which points I was willing to accept that I was guilty.

There were thirty-four points, but only on those two points on which I had agreed with the attorneys. The judge asked, "Do you feel you are guilty or not?" He was certainly aware of the negotiations, and the people who were negotiating were aware that four hundred thousand dollars would be the fine. All these liars, cunning people... No, my people do not know the whole story yet. I am going to tell them. That is one of the purposes of my world trip, so everybody becomes aware of the ugly face of the American government. It is a fascist government. It tried to kill me. Afraid that if bail was granted and having no chance to win in the trial, they had put a bomb in the room where I was to come back from the court to collect my clothes. But they missed by a little bit: they had no idea at what time I would be coming, and it was a time bomb. The whole area was empty; everybody knew something was going to happen. Even the person who brought me in said to me, "You sit down, and I will be coming soon with the signature of my boss. Then I can release you." He locked the door from outside, and even he disappeared. And from everybody's face, the person who brought me to the jail, the person who said, "I am going to take the signature..." I could see that there was some conspiracy behind it. But that's what I say: my trust in existence... They defeated their own conspiracy.

They could not manage to keep me there for as long as they had set the time on the bomb. They had to release me, and immediately after my release the bomb was found exactly under my chair. I am going to tell everybody -- not only my people but all the people; not only non-Americans, but Americans too through the news media -- that they are living under another fascist regime, under another Adolf Hitler, Ronald Reagan, who is millions of times more powerful than poor old Adolf Hitler... My whole effort will be to expose America completely. It is not against the American people -- I love them, they are beautiful -- it is against the bureaucracy and the politicians. They have to be overthrown. They are the most dangerous people in the world today, because they have the greatest power, and I don't think they have any brains. I am reminded of a story... It must have been an American politician whose brain was being operated on -- brain surgery. They had taken out his whole brain, and they were working on it in the next room while he was silently sleeping. At that very moment a man came into the room and said, "What are you doing here? Have you not heard? -- you have been chosen for president!" He said, "My God, and I am lying down here!" He stood up, went out of the hospital... When the surgeons came they could not find him. They said, "What has happened?" Somebody told them, "He has been chosen for president."

They said, "But the brain is still here." They phoned the president, "Please come back and take your brain." He said, "As long as I am president I don't need it!" HOW DO YOU FEEL NOW, PERSONALLY, AFTER ALL THE COMMOTION THAT HAPPENED PRIOR TO YOUR DEPARTURE FROM THE USA?

As far as I am concerned, I simply feel great, just as great as before all the commotion, as great as I was in the commotion. There is no change in my inner consciousness. It is utterly silent and utterly rejoicing, in every situation. Even the American jailer, after twelve days, had to accept me. He said, "I am an old man and I am just going to be retired soon, but you are my first prisoner -- thousands of people have been in this prison -- to be going out of the prison looking better, healthier than you entered twelve days ago. What is the secret?" I said, "The secret is simple: I enjoyed the whole scene. It was a great learning for me, and all your efforts to harass me..." They did not allow me to sleep for twenty-four hours in the whole twelve days. They would put me in a cell exactly between two television sets, and the television sets would be going as loud as possible from the early morning till midnight, continuously. And they had made arrangements that after the television sets were silent, then the inmates would start talking from one cell to another -- loudly of course, because if you are talking from one cell to another cell, you have to talk very loudly.

And this continued till the television sets would start again. So I said, "It has been a great opportunity for me. I rested, and my rest is something that you cannot disturb. I am the center of the cyclone. And I am looking better because you have been refusing me vegetarian food. You have been telling me that there is no special arrangement, that I have to eat whatsoever is available. I have asked if you can just give me milk, if you can give me fruit or vegetables. You said no, that whatever is available and is given to every prisoner would be given to me. "So I was not eating, and I saw that the prisoners were more human than the bureaucrats. Seeing the situation, they started bringing their milk, their fruit, and they would tell me, `Osho, I know they are torturing you. There are fruits, there are vegetables, there is milk. We are given everything, but we can eat meat; there is no problem, you can take....' So I have lost eight pounds in weight, which my personal physician Dr. Devaraj was continuously wanting. That's why I am looking good." A tremendous feeling has arisen in me that even if you throw me into hell -- you have already done that -- you cannot disturb my paradise. Wherever I am, my paradise will be with me. You can kill me, but you cannot kill my spirit.


OshO

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