actually, most "sadhus" are frauds who want to make money, especially from tourists.
I know

I've been to India 3 times. First time I travelled around for 4 months. Some sadhus are genuine, many are fake, and almost all of them smoke charas all day.
cannabis certainly isn't legal in India, and the growing, more and more westernized middle class of India frowns upon drug use, but Bhang is sold in shops anyway, even to tourists. and in remote regions in the Himalaya I guess growing hemp is very prevalent, haven't been there to be able to confirm this myself though...
Yes, you are absolutely right, I was exagerating to make a point. And India
is changing,
But:
"Used during observance of certain Hindu rituals. Government-owned shops in holy cities like Varanasi sell cannabis in the form of bhang. Despite the high prevalent usage, this law is Illegal but rarely enforced and treated as a low priority across India. Tourist may often be searched by police officers, but usually in the goal of being bribed and not punished. Further, large tracts of cannabis grow unchecked in the wild in many parts of northern and southern India in many states such as West Bengal, Himachal Pradesh, Tripura, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, and Tamilnadu.[ many states such as West Bengal, Tripura, and the North East have their own laws
allowing cannabis, locally known as ganja."
It might not be officially legal in all of India, but in reality, it might as well be.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legality_of_cannabis_by_country
This year at a festival, I heard a lecture speculating that "soma" might be a brew similar to ayahuasca, backed up my lots of scientific and historical sources, but the lector himself said, that it is just his theory, he wasn't claiming it as a fact.
It's unlikely we will ever know what soma was, but as I said, archeological evidence as well as the physical descriptions in the rig veda of the plant itself, and its effects, only point at two serious contenders to the title: cannabis or ephedra.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soma
Ismene, sorry, I can't even be bothered to answer your post.