In 1991, American writer Karen Jonson wasn’t in love and was in a dead-end job when she joined an ashram, the Jagadguru Kripalu Parishat (JKP) in Austin, Texas, attracted by local guru Prakashanand Saraswati’s talks “about god and loving god”. The JKP proclaims the divinity of Kripaluji Maharaj. In the beginning, she was happy to be among a group of people who had the same feeling and purpose, picking green beans by the moonlight, cooking meals, acting in skits. After living in the ashram for 15 years, she quit in 2008, three years before Prakashanand was found guilty on 20 counts of child sex abuse. Jonson published a tell-all book, Sex, Lies and Two Hindu Gurus, which JKP followers dismiss as a ‘Christian conspiracy’. Here Jonson tells Debarshi Dasgupta how her spiritual quest went awry: