I decided to analyse international statistics to clarify this question. For comparison I have taken such countries as Pakistan and Bangladesh, which are historical and cultural neighbours of India, as well as another country from a different region (Indonesia), which is among the 10 countries with the most numerous population and geographically quite close to India. Sampling these countries I have used very general considerations and my intuition (as I am not an economist) so I think my choice of these countries might be disputable. I could find data only for the period of 1970-1988. So those who are interested in continuing this analysis up to the present time should launch their own inquiry. Only in the case of literacy was I  able to find data up to 2000 published by UNESCO.

Among economic indicators I have chosen a GDP (Gross Domestic Product) per person. This reflects economic standard of life in a society. In India this indicator is very low. In 1988 it was 335 USD per person, and in a world list of countries India occupied 121st position after Pakistan and Indonesia. For recent years no trend demonstrating a possibility of any economic miracle has been detected yet.

The next important indicator is military expenditure. This indicator, especially for developing countries, reflects the moral maturity of a society and its relationships with neighbours. Military expenditure is a part of GDP that otherwise could be spent on social programmes. In India it is about 3% of GDP and in 1988 was 8.2 billion USD. Apparently, this expenditure is partly explained by military opposition to Pakistan. All these years India kept a big army (1,362, 000 people in active service in 1988) that was about three times as big as the Pakistan army (481,000).

Another indicator is population. The demographic problem is very acute in India. The rate of growth of population in India and Indonesia is very similar (from 1970 to 1988 - 148% and 147% correspondingly), but many socio-economic indicators of Indonesia are much better than their counterparts in India.

An indicator which reflects the cultural development of a country is its level of illiteracy. Although in all countries presented in the table the level of illiteracy was diminishing over these years, only Indonesia managed to decrease the level of illiteracy from 27.4 million in 1970 to 19.2 million in 1988. In other countries presented in the table the absolute number of illiterate people was growing and in India it was 299 million people in 1988 against 251 million in 1970.

The last indicator is the infant mortality rate, that is the number of infants who died during their first year per 1000 born in that year. This indicator reflects the state of medical care and women’s status in society. In India the figure was very high and even in 1988 it was 98 infants per thousand. Every person who has ever visited India has been able to notice that questions of sanitation and hygiene have still not been solved. It is worth noting that this indicator for countries presented in the table correlates very well with GDP per person, that is, the higher GDP per person, the lower infant mortality rate.

Statistical data are taken from “Comparative World Data” by G.P.Muller. John Hopkins Univ. Press, 1988. For year 1988 data are taken from “Economist Book of Vital Statistics”, Times Book, 1990. Illiteracy data are taken from www.unesco.org.

Despite the fact that India, as it is believed by Sathya Sai Baba’s followers, since 1940 has been under supervision of Sai Baba, Kali Yuga Avatar, who has been successfully conducting his mission there, it has not had any distinct influence on those socio-economic parameters which are internationally considered as indicators of standard of living and prosperity in a society. In contrast with the low level of economic and social development India spent huge sums of money on military programmes, including expenditures on creating and testing nuclear weapons which Pakistan possesses as well.

From a social point of view India can be considered as a country with a high percentage of illiterate population, and a far from satisfactory level of medical care, sanitation and hygiene, which accountable for such problems in the country as leprosy, regular cholera outbreaks, people dying of starvation and water deprivation. The moral and cultural problems of India are also quite acute. They are: the remnants of the caste system, discrimination against women and corruption that has infected all levels of Indian society. For example, the former Prime minister of India N. Rao, who is a follower of Sai Baba, has been accused of corruption and is now in prison.

When faced with these statistical data, it is very hard to guess that the spiritual, social and economic development of India has been guided for several decades by the Divine Will of the Avatar, i.e. the Divine embodied in a human form. It is especially hard if we take into account that other countries - in our analysis, Indonesia - manage to deal with those problems much more successfully without claiming such Divine guidance.

So, it is extremely difficult to see any beneficial influence of Sai Baba on Indian society in general or are we to assume that it is going on somewhere on a subtle plane and has not been manifesting itself yet in thoughts, words and deeds for India’s inhabitants. Therefore, if we can’t see any signs of distinctive improvement in the social and economic life of India from 1970 till 1988 as a result of Sai Baba’s mission, it is hardly reasonable to expect to find it in the world as a whole.