Unholy Mess at Kirtanananda's Hare Krishna Temple

BY: STAFF CORRESPONDENT

Aug 14, NEW YORK (NY POST) — In a recent Washington Post article, correspondent Janon Fisher described the battle current underway between factions of the Hare Krishna movement. According to the Post, the New York devotees are "in the middle of a civil war following a string of lawsuits and a fistfight in its East Village temple in recent months, court papers show."

Fisher describes the circumstances of Kirtanananda's "Sanctuary" in New York, officially known as the New York chapter of the Interfaith League of Devotees. The Sanctuary's atmosphere was described by in a very critical article in The Post magazine in March of last year. Now the Sanctuary is being sued by its nationwide leader, Kirtanananda, for putting the sect's nonprofit status in jeopardy by renting rooms at the temple building to tourists. The temple's B&B currently takes in more than $300,000 a year.

Fisher wrote, "Joe Bonomo, a k a His Holiness Krsna Balarama Swami, filed the suit against the group's treasurer, Susan Bauer, a k a Eternal Love, in Manhattan Supreme Court last month.

Submitted as evidence is a Post investigative article that details a reporter's weeklong stay at the devotee digs and that uncovers the cult's method of getting cash from unsuspecting guests and pushing them toward Krishna.

The bed-and-breakfast, which remains in operation, makes an estimated $360,000 a year tax-free, according to Bonomo's attorney, Krishnan Chittur.

"The bed-and-breakfast is generating huge amounts of cash money - $30,000 to $50,000 a month," he said.

A second lawsuit, filed in Brooklyn Supreme Court, alleges that when Bauer learned of board director David Chatterjee's dissent over the B&B in May 2000, a group of her supporters, including ex-husband Nark Kumaravelam, attacked Chatterjee in the third-floor temple and physically threw him out of the headquarters.