12. Bikram Choudhury Earnings Go Up To $75 Million
Bikram Choudhury is an Indian author, yoga teacher and the founder of the Bikram Yoga (hot yoga) method. Bikram has declared this method of yoga restored his health after being in a crippling weightlifting accident at age 20. In the 1970s Choudhury emigrated to the United States and founded many yoga studios to later start offering teacher certification courses. Currently, there are thousands of Bikram certified instructors with Bikram Yoga studios around the world. Bikram has been involved in several lawsuits with allegations including sexual harassment, sexual assault, sexual battery, false imprisonment, and discrimination. Jane Doe sued Bikram with an allegation of sexual battery and rape and has stated that the teacher recruits foreign volunteers who are “so in fear of defendant Bikram Choudhury’s wrath that they will travel to the US and risk violating immigration laws in order to serve him.” Jafa-Bodden worked closely with the teacher and claims she was both a witness and victim of Bikram’s “severe, ongoing, pervasive and offensive conduct” towards women, homosexuals, African-Americans and other minorities. In 2016 the yoga guru returned to India opening several more yoga studios. According to his attorney, Choudhury will not come back to the US and hopes to testify over Skype to defend himself on the other pending court cases.
