[10][11] After earning a degree in physics at Allahabad University in 1942, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi became an assistant and disciple of Swami Brahmananda Saraswati (also known as Guru Dev), the Shankaracharya (spiritual leader) of the Jyotir Math in the Indian Himalayas.

[33] While a few sources say that he worked at the Gun Carriage Factory in Jabalpur for some time,[34][35] most report that in 1941 he became an administrative secretary to the Shankaracharya of the Jyotir Math, Swami Brahmananda Saraswati (also known as Guru Dev, which means "divine teacher")[31][36][37][38][11] and took a new name, Bal Brahmachari Mahesh.

[16] According to Coplin, in his visits to southern India, the Maharishi spoke English rather than the Hindi spoken in his home area to avoid provoking resistance among those seeking linguistic self-determination, and to appeal to the "learned classes".

[31] Though most of his audience consisted of average middle class individuals, he also attracted a few celebrities, such as Efrem Zimbalist Jr., Nancy Cooke de Herrera and Doris Duke.

[11] In 1960, the Maharishi traveled to many cities in India, France, Switzerland, England, Scotland, Norway, Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, and Africa.

[68][69] While in Manchester, England, the Maharishi gave a television interview and was featured in many English newspapers, such as the Birmingham Post, the Oxford Mail and the Cambridge Daily News.

[73] While in England, he appeared on BBC television and gave a lecture to 5,000 people at the Royal Albert Hall in London, organised by Leon MacLaren of the School of Economic Science.

[91][92] While travelling in America, the Maharishi met with Robert Maynard Hutchins, the head of the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions, and U Thant, the Secretary General of the United Nations.

[99] That year, an article in Time magazine reported that the Maharishi "has been sharply criticised by other Indian sages, who complain that his programme for spiritual peace without either penance or asceticism contravenes every traditional Hindu belief".

[102] In 1967, the Maharishi's fame increased and his movement gained greater prominence when he became the "spiritual advisor to the Beatles",[95][103] though he was already well-known among young people in the UK and had already had numerous public appearances that brought him to the band's attention.

[11] He and the Beatles met in London in August 1967, when George Harrison and his wife Pattie Boyd urged their friends to attend the Maharishi's lecture at the Hilton on Park Lane.

By 2016, some of it had been reclaimed with building repairs, cleared paths, a small photo museum, murals, a cafe and charges for visitors, although the site remains essentially a ruin.

[134][135] He visited Ottawa during this tour and had a private meeting with Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau, during which he spoke about the principles of TM and "the possibility of structuring an ideal society".

[97] The TM organization made a number of property investments, buying a former Rothschild mansion in England, Mentmore Towers in Buckinghamshire, Roydon Hall in Maidstone, Swythamley Park in the Peak District, and a Georgian rectory in Suffolk.

[144] The Maharishi commissioned plans from a prominent architect for the world's tallest building, a Vedic-style pyramid to be built in São Paulo, Brazil, and to be filled with Yogic Flyers and other TM endeavours.

[97] In 2003, David Lynch began a fundraising project to raise US$1 billion "on behalf of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi" to build a meditation centre large enough to hold 8,000 skilled practitioners.

'"[186][187][188] A week before his death, the Maharishi said that he was "stepping down as leader of the TM movement" and "retreating into silence" and that he planned to spend his remaining time studying "the ancient Indian texts".

[190][191] The funeral, with state honours, was carried by Sadhana TV station and was presided over by one of the claimants to the seat of Shankaracharya of the North, Swami Vasudevananda Saraswati Maharaj.

[195] One nephew, Girish Chandra Varma,[196] is chairman of the Maharishi Vidya Mandir Schools Group[197][198] and a "senior functionary of the Transcendental Meditation (TM) movement in India.

[217][218][219] One religion scholar, Michael York, considers the Maharishi to have been the most articulate spokesman for the spiritual argument that a critical mass of people becoming enlightened through the practice of "meditation and yogic discipline" will trigger the New Age movement's hoped-for period of postmillennial "peace, harmony, and collective consciousness".

[221] Some religious studies scholars have further said that Maharishi Mahesh Yogi is one of a number of Indian gurus who brought neo-Hindu adaptations of Vedantic Hinduism to the West.

[231] According to Roy Ascott, MVS also explains the potential for every human being to experience the infinite nature of transcendental consciousness, also defined as Being or Self, while engaged in normal activities of daily life.

[244][245][246][247][248] The book is dedicated to Maharshi Bala Brahmachari Mahesh Yogi Rajaram by his devotees of Kerala and contains photographs, letters and lectures by numerous authors, which appear in various languages, such as English, Hindi and Sanskrit.

Weidmann describes the book as the Maharishi's fundamental philosophical treatise, in which its author provides an illustration of the ancient Vedic traditions of India in terms that can be easily interpreted and understood by the scientific thinking of the Western world.

[258] Forem states that in his interpretation of the Gita, the Maharishi expressed several times that as man gains greater awareness through the practice of Transcendental Meditation, he gradually establishes a level of contentment which remain increasingly grounded within him and in which the mind does not waver and is not affected by either attachment or fear.

[274] In a review of the documentary film David Wants to Fly, Variety magazine reported Swaroopananda's assertion that "as a member of the trader caste" the Maharishi "has no right to give mantras or teach meditation".

In the same film, another assistant, Judith Bourque, details how the Maharishi had sex with her multiple times over the course of two years before moving on to other women, with instructions including "don't tell anyone" and, in the case of her becoming pregnant, to "get married quick".

[292] Sociologist William Sims Bainbridge writes that the Maharishi taught a "highly simplified form of Hinduism, adapted for Westerners who did not possess the cultural background to accept the full panoply of Hindu beliefs, symbols, and practices.

[311][312] Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, in his farewell message on 11 January 2008, announced the establishment of the Brahmananda Saraswati Trust (BST), named in honour of his teacher, to support large groups totalling more than 30,000 peace-creating Vedic Pandits in perpetuity across India.

[186] The Maharishi is credited with heading charitable organisations, for-profit businesses, and real estate investments whose total value has been estimated at various times, to range from US$2 to US$5 billion.