Réza Ganjavi
MBA, BSCS, BA PHIL
Magna Cum Laude, Phi Kappa Phi, Alpha Gamma Sigma
<contact info>
www.rezamusic.com · www.emfcrisis.com
4 September 2022
To:
· UK Charity Commission
· Hampshire Police Department, UK
· Gstaad Police Department, Switzerland
Copy:
· Home Office Immigration Unit
· UK Department of Education
· UK Independent Schools Inspectorate (ISI)
· UK Office for Standards in Education (OFSTED)
Complaint Against Krishnamurti Foundation Trust (KFT, “Trust”), Brockwood Park School, Raman Patel, Mina Masoumian, Nasser Shamim
Coordinates of Subjects of Complaint:
· Address: Bramdean, Alresford, Hampshire, SO24 0LQ, UK
· KFT Charity Registration No. 312865 (England and Wales).
· KFT Company Registration No. 1055588 (England and Wales)
· Brockwood Park Krishnamurti Educational Centre Ltd. Co. 01055539
Complaint Forum:
· Hampshire, UK Police (Winchester Bureau)
· Bern Switzerland Cantonal Police (Gstaad Bureau)
· UK Charity Commission
I, Reza Ganjavi, have been part of a team of people concerned about mismanagement of KFT/Brockwood Park. I was called on (because of my professional background and competences) by concerned parties to help investigate several reports of alleged troubling treatment of people, collapse of a great school (Inwoods) run by the Trust, divergence from the core values and objectives of the Trust, apparent governance issues with the board of trustees, etc.
We worked as a team and interviewed and received statements from over sixty (60) witnesses. Our research started with a totally open mind, we were objective, and after facts and not fulfilling a hypothesis. We received numerous testimonies which were very consistent, and we analyzed them, and inquired more, and developed what we believe to be a fairly accurate understanding of the root causes of the issues, which we believe is due to serious governance and mismanagement issues.
We compiled a report which is about 300 pages currently, and we are about to file a formal complaint with the UK Charity Commission.
This has been a long, exhaustive process, as we turned every stone along the way, in search of truth. The Trust had allegedly done an extensive job of concealing certain facts, e.g., the real reasons for the undermining of the Inwoods Director, which led to collapse of that great school with 93% of students leaving. So we had a very difficult job of trying to get to the truth, and solving numerous puzzles, involving the false excuses the Trust had allegedly fabricated to cover up for the mismanagement.
We uncovered deep rooted alleged governance issues at the board of trustee level, including alleged conflict of interest, and alleged troubling mismanagement and competence issues at the executive level, and very disconcerting alleged influence of a large donor and his “gang” as he calls them, on the operation of the Trust which has allegedly contributed to the issues above.
All these are discussed in detail in out upcoming complaint to the Charity Commission and release of updated research report which we’ve been updating with new testimonies, analysis, key findings over the course of the last few months.
The Trust became aware of our work and we believe has allegedly made superficial changes in its management structure to give the appearance of change ahead of Charity Commission potential audit, but the problem is at the board of trustee level, and only the Charity Commission has the power to replace part of the entire board, which in our view, is the only solution that can rescue the Trust.
We followed the Charity Commission required process by contacting the Trust with a list of issues. We retained a charity specialist lawyer in London who sent a letter to the Trust with a list of fourteen (14) issues we’ve identified.
The Trust’s failed to address any of the issues we raised, and got engaged in a wicked personalization of the issue, trying to blame me, Reza Ganjavi, with the work that us, as a team, have done. I am just a member of a team of people that includes close friends of Krishnamurti, former staff, students, donors, and other stakeholders. We have strong support from several other current and former trustees of other Krishnamurti foundations, and close friends of his.
Their futile attempt to blame our work on me, extended in trying to discredit me, by lying about me – the old trick of trying to discredit the messenger in order to discard the message. But in this case, I’m not even the messenger per se – we are as a team. And unfortunately for the Trust, it’s impossible to discredit me without acting unlawfully because I have an impeccable background, education, professional experience, and stellar personal, academic and professional references and long roster of important accomplishments in a variety of fields from computer science to classical music.
The Trust lied to its own lawyer, who wrote in the response to our accountability demand, that I had somehow tried to do the same things with their sister foundation in America (Krishnamurti Foundation America (KFA) and the dialogues yielded no results, therefore, the Trust is not interested in a dialogue with us. That is a completely dishonest statement.
There was never such a dialogue. The KFA executive director refused to have a dialogue. As illustrated in our report, the executive director at KFA was appointed by Friedrich Grohe (the large donor mentioned above)’s “gang” member / employee, Rabindra Singh, who became the secretary of the board of trustees at KFA (top position) – very similar to the situation at the Trust:
Raman Patel, who is part of the Grohe Gang, and on his payroll, has had extensive influence on the Trust. Patel and Grohe brought in the former co-director of Brockwood, and the place went downhill, and then they brought Nasser Shamim and Mina Masoumian, who remained in UK on work visa.
Mr. Grohe himself (who lives a few minutes from Gstaad where KFT filed an allegedly bogus police report, which the police declined to investigate) comes from a plumbing supplies background, and he's hardly an intellectual or a free thinker, in my view; and it seems Raman Patel’s most notable career has been as a cook, and he has no academic background or professional experience running any kind of organization (except a small kitchen). So they’re not particularly qualified to engage in bringing staff to the Trust to fill top positions.
Their latest pick, Shamim and Masoumian came as consultants to review the School and ended up, with the support of Patel and Grohe, to assume top positions. Shamim became the executive director of the Trust and Masoumian became the most powerful person at the School. They engaged in sometimes allegedly very troubling and problematic firings of almost everyone who was there before their time.
Our research revealed a lot which is found in our Report. For example, allegedly several cases of Shamim shouting at people, even people allegedly crying as a result, and Masoumian assuming top positions in the School including pastoral care, while neither Shamim nor Masoumian had any education or background in education or pastoral care – the only thing that got them these top positions were allegedly Grohe/Patel blessing/support.
We also apparently solved the big puzzle of the vicious uprooting of the Inwoods Director, and uncovered the role of dishonest excuses, plots, ploys by the Trust, and motivations of the Shamim/Masoumian/Patel and role of Brockwood Park School’s principal, Antonio Autor (who has received perks from Grohe and is part of his extended team), and his wife’s influence who runs a kindergarten using Brockwood property which they live on, and many reports of her being jealous of Inwoods and the Director’s amazing success at Inwoods. And we uncovered how a weak board of trustees which is over powered by the management team and the “Old Boys” clan is allegedly the root cause of these issues.
We did these as a team, but in their apparent small thinking, the Trust thought they can attack me as a person and discard the enormous work we’ve done as a team. Even then, what about the statements of over 60 people! I didn’t come up with those! So their plot has major holes in it.
In their letter to us, their lawyer accused us of unlawful conduct. Our actions have never been unlawful. For example, she accused us of harassment.
We asked for one example of harassment to support their false allegation.
In response the lawyer could not even cite one example – and she informed us she’s no longer representing them in the case (funny)!!
A trustee of KFT informed us that if we file a complaint with the Charity Commission, the Trust will sue us!!
The Trust tried another ploy, which in our view is an alleged abuse of the police. Mind you, being a tax-exempt organization the Trust probably does not pay for police services which are covered by taxes. Nevertheless it’s entitled to police service, but not to abuse them.
They went into a Hampshire police office and complaint of harassment by email and lied to the police that they had informed me that they didn’t want to receive emails – while this was never done – and they could not provide any evidence.
The police apparently fell for them, without examining the evidence (that didn’t exist) and contacted me, which I was not at all happy about because we have never done anything unlawful; there is no evidence of unlawful conduct whatsoever. But the police also informed me that the police will NOT take Brockwood’s case and will not open an investigation.
Apparently, Patel, Shamim, Masoumian were on a paid holiday by Grohe in Switzerland. Because apparently the three of them walked into the police office in Gstaad, and said the same lies about getting harassed. We have never harassed them. Asking for accountability is NOT harassment.
They further “begged” the Swiss police to not reveal their identities. They only disclosed Masoumian’s name to the police. I obtained her name from the police, with advice from a prosecutor I know, who said the police had to cite a laws that would allow it to keep them anonymous – but the police couldn’t. They also confirmed that the second person was a Middle Eastern looking man – and the third person was a tall Indian looking man; so we believe they’re Shamim and Patel.
They referred to emails from beginning of the year onwards – a few emails I had sent which were absolutely related to our research / work. Early in the process, we even invited the trustees and management them to talk to us and give their side of the story. They refused to talk to us.
The only time they told us not to contact them was via their lawyer, many months after the purported emails. We have not contacted them because we haven’t needed to – but if we need to, I don’t believe UK law prohibits public contact with a charity as long as it’s civil and non-abusive. All our communications have been civil and non-abusive so far. We respect the law and abide by it.
Problem for the Trust is that the Trust was not able to provide any evidence of unlawful conduct by us.
Swiss police also decided to NOT take their case and to NOT investigate the matter.
Members of highest level of management at the Trust, the executive director, top person at the School, and former executive director who seems to still be very much involved in key management decisions (the report has an extensive explanation of the superficial role switch between Patel and Shamim, apparently to save face, as testimonies in our report became known), filed police complaints which were not appropriate. They apparently lied to the police saying they had informed me to not contact them – which they absolutely had not, prior to the purported emails (which contained no abusive content whatsoever).
Shamim is a lawyer, though not licensed to practice in UK (but had reportedly, per witnesses, used his lawyer clout in numerous situations in the UK), so at least he should have known that
a) The emails didn’t contain any unlawful content
b) It’s inappropriate to allegedly lie to the police about a purported notice which was never given within their stated timeline of the purported emails.
I am making this complaint for two purposes:
a) If the police deems it appropriate to investigate the matter, and decide to do so, it’s their choice.
b) At a minimum, this letter will be saved in the police records, to shun light on the Trust’s dishonest, baseless, frivolous complaint to the UK and Swiss police.
Charity Commission may want to take note that the way the Trust has handled this case, is very much in line with the mismanagement we uncovered in our extensive research, which will be submitted to the Charity Commission soon.
Best Regards
Reza Ganjavi, MBA
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