The Royal Commission has heard Dr Henry Sztulman at the ashram was distrustful of the children's allegations which were reported to police in 1987.

The resident doctor at a yoga ashram at the centre of a child sex abuse inquiry said he did not believe the rape claims when he first heard them.

Dr Henry Sztulman, a qualified general practitioner and resident of the Satyananda Yoga Ashram from 1979 to 1990, told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse he was distrustful of the children's allegations which were reported to police in 1987.

He continued to visit the ashram's leader, Swami Akhandananda Saraswati, after he was jailed in 1989 over sexual offences committed against ashram children. The conviction was overturned in 1991.

He told the commission he now believes former child residents were sexually abused by their spiritual leader but denied a claim that he treated one child with morphine for minor ailments.

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The doctor's prescribing methods were called into question at the commission, with evidence of a 2002 Medical Tribunal of NSW finding that he was guilty of unsatisfactory professional conduct in relation to prescribing drugs of addiction.

He was reprimanded by the tribunal and placed under supervision for about two years.

Dr Sztulman told the commission he did not witness any of the vicious beatings described in evidence and could not recall the children being deprived of food.

"They were fun loving kids who played around," he said.

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Royal Commission: Satyananda ashram doctor did not see sex abuse