It all started with a document called "The Findings," published in late 2000 by long-term devotees David and Faye Bailey, whose marriage was arranged by Sai Baba. Part of the nearly 20,000-word piece is given over to evidence that Sai Baba fakes his materializations and doesn't magically heal the sick -- revelations that seem self-evident to nonbelievers but provoke fierce debate in devotee circles and blazing headlines in the Indian press.

Most of "The Findings" consists of testimony of sexual harassment and sexual abuse. "Whilst still at the ashram, the worst thing for me -- as a mother of sons -- occurred when a young man, a college student, came to our room, to plead with David, 'Please Sir, do something to stop him sexually abusing us,'" Faye writes. "These sons of devotees, unable to bear their untenable position of being unwilling participants in a paedophile situation any longer, yet unable to share this with their parents because they would be disbelieved, placed their trust in David; a trust which had built over his five years as a visiting professor of music to the Sai college." These pleas eroded the Baileys' faith and finally made them go public.