Vijayapriya Nithyananda: Why is the ‘Kailasa’ rep at UN going viral?

Representatives of Nithyananda’s virtual country, the ‘United States of Kailasa (USK)’ attended a public meeting of the United Nations in Geneva last month, which stunned the world as well as many in India. The fugitive godman posted photos of the all-women delegation on his Twitter account.

Among the members was Vijayapriya Nithyananda, a woman dressed in a saffron saree, wearing a turban and laden with jewellery with rudraksha adorning her neck. She became the face of ‘Kailasa’s’ UN debut.

Vijayapriya spoke during a discussion on February 24 organised by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) and introduced herself as the “permanent ambassador of the United States of Kailasa”. She said Nithyananda is banned from his birth country and is being persecuted for reviving the ancient traditions of Hinduism.

Nevertheless, according to her social networking handles, Vijayapriya lives in Washington, DC, did her BSc Honours in Microbiology from the University of Manitoba, and knows four languages – Hindi, English, French, and Creole and pidgin (French-based). One of the photos uploaded on social media shows her with a huge tattoo of Nithyananda on her right arm.

The UN will ignore the statements made by the representatives of the fictional country, an official told the BBC news agency, calling their submissions “tangential” to the issues being discussed.

The controversial godman left India several years back with a number of cases against him, including rape and sexual assault. However, he has denied all the accusations. After leaving the Asian country, he founded the ‘United States of Kailasa’ on an island off the coast of Ecuador, the BBC reported.

The virtual country has been named after a holy mountain in the Himalayas.