An Imperative Clarification for Balavanta
BY: ANIRUDDHA DAS
Dec 18, SAN SALVADOR, EL SALVADOR (SUN) — While patiently taking my time in gathering facts and refreshing memories to promptly respond to "Krishna das's" last installment, "Nourished by Loving Exchange", I was a little annoyed after reading Balavanta Prabhu's laudatory words for Hridayananda.
The first thing I want to say is that I consider Balavanta to be a good man, a nice and polite devotee. I meet him several times while traveling with Hridayananda at places like Murari Sevaka, the ISKCON Atlanta temple, and Mayapur. He used to always cut jokes with him, or recount to him interesting episodes of the American Civil war, or at the specific request of, and to Hridayananda's heart's content, Balavanta would purposely speak to him with a heavy rural Southern accent. Afterwards I saw him just a couple of times more, in Miami and Alachua.
Even though I have heard that Balavanta is a successful lawyer and consequently an able person in arguing and propounding good logic, his post left me baffled. If he really wanted to underscore Hridayananda's devotional performance, he would have done a much better job reminding us when Hridayananda crisscrossed the United States, placing standing orders of Srila Prabhupada's books in twenty-five universities around the country. Or telling us when in 1974, Hridayananda publicly defeated Professor Bharati, the nonsense Mayavadi who publicly blasphemed Srila Prabhupada and the Srimad-Bhagavatam in an article published by the Illustrated Weekly of India.
But saying that Hridayananda... well, I better quote Balavanta verbatim here:
"He was immediately rejected by family, friends, and the entire society of which he had formerly been a member. He became an outcast. Then as an outcaste and social reject, he went onto the streets and chanted the Holy Names of God... They considered them the names of a "foreign" god. Thus, he was subject to daily abuse and ridicule".
Come on, Balavanta Prabhu! The sacrifices, austerities, self-denial and social rejection you attribute only to Hridayananda, are common to most devotees in the 60s and 70s! And I strongly believe that ever since, many anonymous Matajis and Prabhus have also offered their very lives unto the altar of selfless service to the lotus feet of Srila Prabhupada. They gave up everything —parents, wife, wealth, promising careers— and surrendered fully to serve lovingly His Divine Grace. And they are not demanding respect or payment for their service. They are not merchants.
With my own eyes I have seen many devotees who, at the beginning of their spiritual lives, performed (several are still performing) amazing acts of surrender to please Srila Prabhupada. Such abnegation is not exclusively Hridayananda's. And just for the record, a long time ago he got tired of serving Srila Prabhupada, and voluntarily choose a more easygoing life, to say the least. By the way, again: "Obras son amores y no buenas razones." The direct, literal English translation of this Spanish saying: "Good deeds are acts of love, not good reasons."
Just popping up in my mind right now is the incident where Hunkara das and Brahma das sneaked into Palestine to clandestinely distribute Srila Prabhupada's books to the Mohammedans. They were caught by PLO operatives and beaten severely afterwards. These angry terrorists threatened to kill them – wanting them to confirm they were undercover CIA agents disguised as Hare Krishnas. They were confined in separate prison cells, and no food was given to them. Being born in the U.S., Brahma das took the worst part. When the PLO fanatics took away their japas and kunti-malas, Hunkara managed to secure a cotton tread. He then tied 108 knots on it and would chant his sixteen rounds (or more) every day of his ordeal. I cannot remember how many days they remained captive, but fortunately, after intense scrutiny and intelligence-gathering, they were released and unceremoniously expelled from Arafat's land. These devotees were so bold that they dared to enter such a dangerous place just to please Srila Prabhupada, who humbly said: "I will put on my head the dust of any devotee who would go to preach Krishna consciousness in the Moslem world!" Please, do not read wrongly: these devotees didn't want at all that Srila Prabhupada would ever touch their feet; they just wanted to fulfill a most cherished desire of His Divine Grace.
And what about Sarvabhavana Prabhu? I meet him in Mayapur in December 1995. He was a very sincere Armenian devotee who joined Srila Prabhupada's movement in the U.S.S.R. during the brutal regime of Yuri Andropov. For the "crime" of circulating photocopies of the Russian translation of the Bhagavad-Gita As It Is (which was read by hundreds of people, all anxiously waiting his or her turn), he was apprehended and taken into prison. The guards would administer experimental drugs to force him to give up his beliefs. But he did not give in. He was then sent to a Siberia camp where every single day he received a gruesome pummeling. As a result of receiving so many kicks on his face and head, he almost went blind and his liver was permanently damaged. At the time I meet him, he could barely see with his left eye. Nevertheless, he never renounced his faith neither the divine, saving shelter of Srila Prabhupada. I have never heard from him anymore…
In my opinion, Kalpataru Prabhu (Guatemala R.I.P.), along with Vrajavasi and Brajendra Kumar (Mexico), Arkamitra and Advya (Brazil), were the sankirtana maha-ratis of Latin America in the seventies and eighties. One day in December 1987, Kalpataru approached and revealed to me: "Aniruddha, today I have distributed my one-million-and-one Srila Prabhupada book! I promised Srila Prabhupada I would break the one-million mark. So, by his grace, today I did it!"
In the second semester of 1977, Prabhu das, the first President of the Guatemala temple, carelessly spent the money belonging to the BBT on buying bhoga for the devotees. When Panchadravidra Swami, the local GBC, found it out, he literally put the whole temple on a fast. As a palliative measure to get grains and produce for feeding the devotees, Panchadravida instructed them go out to the public market to beg grains, fruits and vegetables. Many days we went to the dirty, stinky markets in Guatemala City and surrounding areas, and in exchange for our chanting the Holy Names, people would throw us rotten tomatoes and potatoes.
Panchadravida also organized a sankirtana party to be led by Kalpataru. The former specifically ordered the later to spend frugally on bhoga. So Kalpataruji took four brahmacaris with him and for a period of almost a month, took them to the most remote towns of Guatemala, inhabited by the descendants of the Mayas. They distributed thousands of Srila Prabhupada's books to these simple-hearted, colorful people. Upon returning to Guatemala City, the four devotees—except Kalpataru, who was a pioneer vegan—were showing signs of malnutrition. Harinamananda, who came from L.A. weighing 208 pounds, ended up weighing only 146 pounds. The doctor told him he was suffering from acute anemia.
When Panchadravida again returned to the country, he asked the devotees about their experiences in the traveling sankirtana. The four brahmacaris answered that it was an ecstatic and memorable experience to distribute books every day from 8:00 a.m. to 6 p.m., but complained about the austere diet Kalpataru enforced on them. They would have local peanuts and a glass of milk as breakfast, peanuts and one avocado as lunch, and peanuts and a glass of water as dinner. The sankirtana devotees stationed at the temple would have a more protein-rich diet consisting of plates of rice, black beans, white cabbage subji and tortillas three times a day.
Modesty apart, I myself suffered from the same circumstance Balavanta described. Although I have been following the regs and chanting Hare Krishna since 1971, in March 1977, I formally joined the ISKCON temple at Guatemala City. To tell the truth, I'm one of its founders.
My father was a nationally acclaimed literary man who at different times was appointed as the Director of the National Archives, the National Library, and the National Newspaper Library of Guatemala, of which he was the founder. So the man had a lot of political leverage and social prestige. When in March of 1977, the son who had borne his own name became a Hare Krishna. He didn't like it at all. He immediately orchestrated an underground campaign to destroy the "Instituto Yoga de Estudios Védicos para la Conciencia de Krishna", the newly formed civil association representing ISKCON.
To make it short, I was constantly harassed, not only by my family members, but by Government officials and Catholic people. Closing ranks with my father, the newspapers and other media slammed their doors in my face so I couldn't denounce properly his foul playing and the Government's arbitrariness and abuse of authority. The last time I paid a visit to my pious mother was when my elder brother started shoving me and pushing me around. Some weeks later, after returning from a short trip abroad, I was apprehended by secret agents while clearing immigration at the local international airport. Then I was taken without legal warrant to the headquarters of the feared "Policía Judicial". My younger brother was at the airport the same time and providentially saw when the agents were surreptitiously escorting me from the immigration post to the above-mentioned jail. That saved me from a sure "brainwashing", Latin American style… Below you will find a news clip containing the report of an independent American journalist covering the trials I lived as a beginner Hare Krishna, trials which I endured anxiously but gladly to please Srila Prabhupada.
And what about the sacrifices and amazing feats performed by so many stalwart book distributors, like Praghosh, Tripurari, Guruttama, Vaisesika, Kasirama, and so many more maha-ratis? I humbly ask all the readers to read the wonderful narration below from Hari Sauri's Transcendental Diary. By the way, Brighupati Prabhu has more than 36 years of distributing Srila Prabhupada's books non-stop, on a daily basis. He didn't sit tight, like Hridayananda, to have an easygoing, carefree life.
In this way, Balavanta Prabhu, there are thousands upon thousands of Vaisnavas and Vaisnavis who have behaved like heroes and heroines; who have performed never seen, jaw-dropping sacrifices and acts of sacrifice to please our Srila Prabhupada, during and after his physical presence on Earth. So, I beg you with folded hands: please be broad-minded and in your next eulogy, do not mention only Hridayananda, but everyone worthy of praise for their extraordinary dedication to the lotus feet of Srila Prabhupada.
Aniruddha das
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A Transcendental Diary by Hari Sauri dasa
December 9th, 1975
Back in Prabhupada's room after breakfast, Hansadutta read out some particularly ecstatic letters from America describing book distribution. Prabhupada's enthusiastic response to them was clear evidence that, as he said in class, he is fanning, fanning, fanning to bring back the fire of spiritual consciousness in the hearts of the conditioned souls. He has declared the entire world an open house for the introduction of Krishna consciousness. The letters show how seriously his disciples are applying to the task.
…Then Hansadutta prabhu read out an ecstatic report by Uttamasloka, the president of the Chicago temple, although it was not directly addressed to Srila Prabhupada. It described the efforts of the devotees in the recent, record-breaking, Thanksgiving-day book-distribution competition. Out of 5000 books sold by the three temples, Chicago, assisted by nine Radha-Damodara traveling sankirtana party brahmacaris, sold over 2000. The letter was written to Ramesvara prabhu and sent on. Hansaduta read it loud as Prabhupada listened, eyes sometimes wide with amazement and appreciation at the incredible effort and risk his disciples are taking to distribute his books throughout this world of darkness.
"We took the challenge seriously—not that we were puffed up and over confident of victory—for we knew that anything could happen by Lord Caitanya's mercy. Then the first crew left—16 men and women—they were distributing by about 6:30 a.m. Later a small party went out by about 10:00 a.m. with more books and prasadam, and later on in the day several others came out. Altogether there were about 25 devotees at the airport throughout the day. Sripati and I sort of floated about helping in different ways, like you did. There were the 17 regular distributors plus Tripurari Swami and a couple of weekend regulars and a few more newcomers.
"In the first hour and half most of the distributors had done 15 to 25 books, so by the time we got out (about 11:00 a.m.) they had already done about 300-400 books! The mornings are always good. Things were quiet; not too many announcements and no break up or hassles. We all met together for lunch at 1:00 p.m. and took a preliminary count: over 750 books—we were close to breaking the world's record half way through the day. By 1:00 p.m. Manusuta dasa had already done 100!!!!!! Praghosa dasa 80!!!!, and Tripurari Swami 70!!!! Our hairs began to stand on end a little as we speculated about the potential results and everyone was back distributing by 1:30 p.m.
"Basically we distribute two terminals…there is a corridor about 25ft. wide that the people funnel through after coming from the ‘fingers' …All the passengers come through there on their way to the baggage claim and also on their way to a flight. We found out from the paper next morning that over 220,000 people came through the airport that day!!!!
"At about 4:00 p.m. a demon worker of the airlines came up to one devotee and punched him in the face; the men were stunned. Then he went to another devotee and punched him in the face! The men and karmis began to congregate. Tripurari Swami came running to see what was happening; the demon punched him in the face!!! All of the devotees immediately jumped on the demon and began beating the stool out of him!!!!!!! There was a huge crowd all around and the devotees were shouting for the police to stop this man. There was blood on his face and on the ground. Praghosa punch had drawn blood and there were drops of blood on Praghosa's clothes and drops of perspiration on his face: he was feeling very blissful!!"
Prabhupada' eyes opened wide at the description of the fight. "Accha! " he said in surprise, shaking his head in wonder at the risks his men were taking on his and Krishna's behalf. Hansaduta was laughing and shaking his head in awe, and he read on.
"Half the crowd was in our favor and the other half against. The police came in and the demon said that we had given him a book and then taken it back and started a fight. The police arrested the devotees! This is typical of all the incidents—they attack us and we get arrested! Anyway somehow or another, by Krishna's grace, the devotees were released and back distributing in 20 minutes.
"Around 6 p.m. I took a preliminary count… I sat in the phone booth and added the score. As I added my eyebrows began to raise higher and higher! My eyes began to bulge from their sockets!! My mouth dropped open! I was speechless! Tears actually began to flow from my eyes! We had broken 1400 books! I couldn't believe it; I was stunned and took another count to be sure, and sure enough, it was right. I began to shout in ecstasy ‘Hari Bol, Hari Bol, Hari Bol!' All the karmis were looking at me through the phone booth with screwed up faces of bewilderment.
"When I got back there had been another incident…. A couple of plainclothers (cops) had tried to set up one of the women for an arrest and she tried to get one of the men to help her. One of the men tried to intervene and they arrested him and took him downstairs. Another mother went down to find the girl whom they tried to arrest and when the cops saw her they said "Where's is the other girl?" "I don't know," she said.
"OK, then we'll arrest you instead!" "Hey, let me go! I didn't do anything!" Two small scuffles broke out with the two devotees and the police. Another devotee came in to stop it…and the police turned on him and the three of them mercilessly beat him up on the floor in front of many bystanders! One of the policemen's guns fell out during the scuffle and books were scattered everywhere. The devotees were then taken into jail downtown (the two men devotees). Of course this knocked at least 100 books off our score."
Prabhupada was listening with rapt attention to the whole description, occasionally raising his eyebrows in surprise and shaking his head and smiling in appreciation. He was aglow with obvious pride at the determination of his disciples to sell his books despite all obstacles, and he listened to the entire report, blow by blow.
"While we listened to this incident and took prasadam, a demon who had found three books ripped them up and threw them in our midst. Unaffected, a little tired, but undaunted in their determination, the devotees went back to distribute. Meanwhile a huge blizzard began and traffic started jamming both on the roads and in the air…. At 10:30 p.m. I got a report from Sripati: over 1700 books—we might break 2000!!!! This is incredible!! Who can imagine the mercy of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu? All but four of the men were coming back at 11:30 p.m.—Manusuta w/ 191; Praghosa w/ 153; Tripurari Swami w/ 135, and Ranganatha w/ 120. The first crew returned in the blizzard by 2:00 p.m. Everyone struggled to get up for mangala arati (the four latecomers didn't even go to sleep) and after and ecstatic kirtana I ran around to get the final scores…. On Thursday we fasted from breakfasted and chanted and slept till noon arati when we had a big arati, kirtana and after a nice feast!!!!
"Thank you for inspiring us to compete for the mercy or the Spiritual Master. If it weren't for you we wouldn't know what to do. All glories to Srila Prabhupada!
Your servant, Uttamasloka dasa."
Another page carried the totals for each distributor. Two men did over for hundred between them: Manusuta set a new individual world's record with 210 books, Praghosa was just behind with 200. Another seven, Tripurari Swami, Ranganatha, Romapada, Buddhimanta and Prekara prabhus, including two women, Sadbhuja and Jagaddhatri dasis, broke the one-hundred-book mark. The grand total was 2042 hardbound books.
At the bottom of the list Uttamasloka added a note to Ramesvara: "My humble suggestion and request is that you read this letter and all of its contents to the assembled devotes of New Dvaraka Dhama. Even though it is irregularly composed and full of mistakes and errors, it is still very transcendentally pleasing and will be relished by all."
At the top of the letter Ramesvara had written in large, clear capital letters: "THE MOST ECSTATIC SKP NEWSLETTER OF ALL TIME! SHOULD BE READ ALOUD TO ALL OF THE ASSEMBLED DEVOTEES!"
When Hansaduta finished, Srila Prabhupada had a huge smile on his face, clearly pleased and obviously enjoying transcendental ecstasy. He dictated his reply, not to Ramesvara but to Uttamasloka. "Please accept my blessings. I read your sankirtana newsletter with great relish. Europe and America are in great danger, this Hare Krishna movement is enveloping them. The sankirtana devotees are very, very dear to Krishna. Because they are doing the field work of book distribution, Krishna has immediately recognized them as true servants. Just like during war time, a farm boy or ordinary clerk who goes out to fight for his country on the front, immediately becomes a national hero for his sincere effort. So Krishna immediately recognizes a preacher of Krishna consciousness who takes all risks to deliver his message.
"It is called dhira bratta—determination. These boys and girls are mahatmas—mahatmanas tu mam partha, daivim prakrtim asritah, bhajanty ananya manaso, jñatva bhutadim avyayam: —‘O son of Prtha, those who are not deluded, the great souls, are under the protection of the divine nature. They are fully engaged in devotional service because they know Me as the Supreme Personality of Godhead, original and inexhaustible.' This verse is applicable here. If these boys were under the material nature they would not take so much risk. They are mahatma, they are real mahatma, not the long beard and saffon cloth mahatma. They are unswerving in their determination, dhira bratta. All glories to the American devotees!
"I hope this letter finds you and all the sankirtana devotees well,
Your ever well-wisher,
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami."
