Mar 16, 2014 — SOUTH AMERICA (SUN) — Dear Hridayananda Maharaj and GBC body:
Dandavats pranams.
I have just come to know that you, Hridayananda dasa Goswami my godbrother - sannyas guru, has been put into quarantine due to your westernized style of preaching. It sounds almost amusing to me that this is happening now, 25 years after I was put in quarantine by you and other god-brothers, for speaking about some disgraces ISKCON was experiencing at that time and for proposing solutions to these problems.
Let me help you and others remember what actually took place 25 years ago. I still live in a quarantine which was never lifted, examined, or investigated. It is neither my intention to write a book here, nor do I want to bore anybody. I just think it is good moment to compare, reflect and rejoice on how things are happening by the grace of the Lord. I have a positive attitude. I am grateful. I love all of you. I ask you to forgive my mistakes. I thank you all for the beautiful experiences in Srila Prabhupada's family.
Being in quarantine now, even for other reasons, you may understand to some extent how it feels when others are judging you, without understanding your position and motivations. I am still waiting for the last 25 years for a clarification call.
We are one family. Nobody can change that fact. The reason we can call ourselves one family is because of Srila Prabhupada and not because of the GBC.
I was the regional secretary of Colombia back in 1982. Some of my prominent misgivings in ISKCON were caused for defending you. Pancadravida Swami insisted at that time that he should be the zonal guru of Colombia instead of you. I objected to this change of gurus like light bulbs. We have seen what happens then taking the example of Chile, Peru and some other places. Jayapataka Maharaj had taken from you the guru post for these countries. It was caused by the schemes of Jagad Jivan prabhu. I saw how many of your disciples became disenfranchised in the new situation. I did not want this to happen to the devotees I was working with and in the area where I was preaching. This was my only motivation for defending you. There were no other personal reasons, not in favor of someone nor against someone.
I appreciate you and Pancadravida Swami, believe it or not and it was not different at that time.
As a result of the actions I took to defend you as the guru, I was kicked out from my service by Pancadravida Swami. Afterwards, you helped me to get back to my service in Colombia after a GBC meeting in Miami.
All these personal experiences, as well as some obvious misbehavior of prominent ISKCON gurus and authorities, helped me understand the difficulties of the zonal guruship. I wrote about all this, including how you had been guilty of the banning of Srila Prabhupada's movement in Guatemala. This document was never sent out by me. Daru Krishna prabhu from Lima saw it and made a copy which he sent to Jayapataka Maharaja. Maharaja then sent it out to others. Bhagavan prabhu called this paper "The Scandal Purana". My proposal at the end of this paper was to set up a kind of ritvik system to save Srila Prabhupada's movement from all those situations.
I myself was not happy with this proposal, but it seemed to be a step into a better direction. I asked also for the opinion of other senior members of the gaudiya vaishnava community. One of them was Srila B.V. Narayana Maharaja. He told me that there is no such a thing as ritvik in our tradition after the departure of a great devotee.
In some way I was left without a clue. Then I arrived at the San Francisco airport one day. Atreya Rsi prabhu received me and gave me the book "Sri Guru and His Grace" by Srila B.R. Sridhara Maharaja. His comment was: "Alanath Swami, here you will find all the answers to our problems." I absorbed this book in one night. And really, I found the answers there. But there was only one problem. The author, Srila B.R. Sridhara Maharaja was already disgraced and on the ISKCON blacklist.
We could see at that time how the double standard applied to Srila Sridhara Maharaja around that Jayatirtha had created a great confusion. I myself and other temple presidents of ISKCON had insisted not to ban Srila Sridhara Maharaja or to send their own men to him to help. The GBC reacted very violently to this request and gave Jayatirtha and all his disciples an ultimatum. Either they will leave the ashram of Srila Sridhara Maharaja and come back to ISKCON or they will be disconnected from the mission of Srila Prabhupada. In case Jayatirtha decided to stay, his disciples were given the chance to accept another bona fide ISKCON GBC approved guru.
As I myself had previously visited Srila Sridhara Maharaja with Dhira Krishna prabhu, I was very sad about the outcome of affairs. Reading his book about guru-tattva (Sri Guru and His Grace) I could understand that we made a big mistake. So I set out on my difficult mission: "How to convince my god-brothers that they can get help from Srila Sridhara Maharaja?" I went to Colombia and worked for many days together with my dear friend Dina Bandhu prabhu. We produced a 14 page analysis of the solutions given by Srila Sridhara Maharaja without quoting him. Rather we searched in Srila Prabhupada's books to find support for Srila Sridhara Maharaja's relevant instructions. We did this for the approaching GBC meeting in 1984 in Mayapur.
Then a big surprise came. After two years of absence from Colombia and of your disciples there, you arrived in Bogota for an unannounced visit. You stormed at mangal artik time accompanied by Arkamitra prabhu and some others. Pancadravida Swami joined later in the same style. You went straight to the vyasasana and announced that you came to stop the revolution. You were probably thinking that all the devotees in our mandir had been reading "The Scandal Purana" and that they were trained by me against ISKCON. The truth is: They had no idea of the all the difficulties. I kept all my doubts to myself and discussed it only with a few friends like Dina Bandhu, with whom I wrote the 14 pages paper on the guru tattva teachings of Srila Sridhara Maharaja, expressed with quotes from Srila Prabhupada's book. You were the guru for my area at that time and I wanted you to be the first to read this paper.
As you were there already, I gave you this paper and asked you if you could please defeat the points there and show me where the mistakes were. You agreed, most probably thinking that you had "The Scandal Purana" in your hands. You started to read our paper seating in the vyasasana. Everything you read was perfectly reasonable. After giving some positive comments, you set a time during the day to hold an istagosthi with all devotees to read the whole paper.
During this istagosthi you were supportive of the points you read in the paper. You promised to go to India to make some changes in ISKCON based on these points. Pancadravida Swami agreed with you. You left Colombia after two days. Passing trough the security you looked back to us and said "ISKCON reform, ki jay".
I never wanted to leave ISKCON. ISKCON is my cradle and Prabhupada is my lord and master. The history I am telling you here is told for the first time, since in my book "In search of purity"-- I only wanted to set the record straight that Srila Sridhara Maharaj was not guilty for any of the problems within ISKCON.
Our relationship was already troubled from the time when you unjustly removed me from my service to Srila Prabhupada in Brazil. Just to remind you. You wanted to spend 10.000 dollars for your room, I guess following the example of Bhagavan dasa from France. It was the money we had collected with the devotees for the Ratha Yatra. So naturally, I objected.
I was removed then for disobedience from my successful service In Brazil. I had to tolerate this injustice and some others, like most of our god-brothers. We had to tolerate it, because there was no other choice if we wanted to stay in ISKCON. We are talking about a time, where staying in ISKCON meant for the most of us, staying in the mission of Prabhupada and Mahaprabhu. In other words leaving ISKCON meant leaving Krishna Consciousness. This unfortunately happened to many of our god-brothers.
So to stay in ISKCON, we had to go along with many crazy ideas coming from your authority. For some reason or another, I ended up in Colombia, where there was no leader at that time. I was given a "village" by "your grace".
After the meeting in Bogota, I was very hopeful to go to India and to help bring about certain reforms necessary in ISKCON. You and Pancadravida Swami promised also to help with the reforms after reading and commenting on my document. Then when I arrived in India I found a few great surprises:
- Pancadravida Swami called me to tell me that he was the new zonal for my region. You resigned because of that and he in exchange did not denounce you for closing ISKCON Guatemala
- When I objected this, you told me that you also did not agree, but that Pancadravida Swami insisted that you do it.
- I decided then to take the case to the GBC again, as I already did before in Miami, when you came to rescue me from Pancadravida Swami's decision to kick me out from Colombia. I had already distributed the 14 page analysis of ISKCON misconceptions to all the GBCs. Upon entering the meeting hall, I was immediately expelled. Then I was taken into a separate room where a group of GBCs informed me about their judgment upon me. I am not sure if they meant it as punishment or as a blessing, but I was told to travel with Jayapataka Maharaja for six months to recover, in this way, my understanding of what it means to be an ISKCON guru.
- Then I was called into another meeting with Jagadisa dasa and Satsvarupa Maharaja. They commented on my 14 page document: "Alanatha Swami you should rather have committed suicide than to dare say that you may leave ISKCON if nothing changes in the zonal guru situation".
I was dismissed with this. I informed the devotees in Colombia by telegram that I was not allowed to return to Colombia. Previously to that meeting, a letter by Pancadravida Swami was sent to all the devotees. He showed his wish to support the changes in the zonal guru system. But now a new situation arose. He himself became a zonal guru and I was removed from his zone.
Very soon I got a call from Colombia. The devotees held an istagosthi after receiving my telegram and they decided that they wanted to continue working with me. They did not want to accept the GBC decision of removing me arbitrarily. So, I went back to Colombia and informed the GBC that we are requesting an independent investigation. We wanted to have the right to stay in ISKCON. We agreed that Satsvarupa Maharaja, Tripurari Maharaja and Atreya Rsi would be the impartial observers of this situation.
Our efforts and desires were to remain in ISKCON, but to be accepted as we were, resulted in another intent of cheating and manipulation by the authorities. Instead of an impartial observation, we received a visit which was more like a CIA undercover operation. Jayapataka Swami, Pancadravida Swami, Prahladananda Swami and several other senior devotees arrived in Bogota. Their main goal was to discredit Srila Sridhara Maharaja, but we were already inspired to follow the advice of this saint, even if the GBCs would prohibit us to do so.
Even after being cheated again I remember telling to Satsvarupa Maharaja on the phone: "We will give the GBC a six month time to evaluate the situation and recognize our right so serve the mission of Prabhupada. Otherwise, we will start our spiritual life all over with a new connection and within a new frame."
I met Satsvarupa Maharaja 25 years later in Puri. He remembered the last words we spoke to each other in this phone call. He begged for forgiveness for what had happened, telling me: "I hope you know it was not my plan. I was dragged into all this." I told him: "I know Maharaja; I trusted you and I wanted you to be an independent observer."
You see my dear Hridayananda Maharaja, even then, after so many difficulties, injustices and attempts of cheating and discredit, we still kept the desire to work with you and Pancadravida Swami for the mission of Prabhupada.
We waited, as announced, for six months. There was no further communication from the GBC, or from you, or anyone else. There was not even a TWO MINUTE CALL, dear brother. We were ousted due to our rebellion against obvious GBC mistakes and because we wanted to associate with a saint, who in no way interfered with our service to Prabhupada. We felt he cleared our doubts, gave us hope and faith in purity and connected us with the greater family of Srila Prabhupada. He inspired us to continue in the mission of Mahaprabhu.
We then held a meeting with all the devotees from the yatra. Everyone could decide for himself how to proceed. Those who desired to stay within ISKCON and work with the GBC could have one or more temples according to their number. Four devotees decided to stay in ISKCON and requested the temple in Medellin as their place.
The rest of us kept our connection with Srila Sridhara Maharaja, most of the rest is known history, maybe except:
- I was denounced by the GBC representative and put in jail by the authorities of Colombia as a monk with a fake worker's visa. After explaining the situation to the authorities and presenting them the work we were doing, inspired by the teachings of Srila Prabhupada, I was released from jail and I immediately received the first religious visa which was given to someone who was not from the Catholic Church.
- I was sent to jail for a second time. The GBC representative accused me of smuggling and kidnapping minors. I went out on bail and after a two year investigation it was proved that I was innocent and that all the accusations were made up by Libardo Lozano, the GBC representative.
- I was called on numerous occasions by the guerilla group "Ricardo Franco". The GBC told them that I am a German exploiting the religious sentiments of the Colombian people. The guerilla offered me two options: to leave Colombia or DIE. I ignored the threats, considering them GBC tactics to scare me. This same guerilla group bombed three targets in Medellin in 1988. One of them was the ISKCON temple. The other two were the Mormon Church and the City Bank. I received a phone call again the next morning. They told me: "How did you like our gift in Medellin? We will put the next one right into your hands." As nothing bad happens without a good reason, I took these threats seriously and started travelling and preaching outside of Colombia. A branch of Prabhupada's mission known today as VRINDA started expanding at that time. Then I published the real story of the events in a major daily newspaper. I informed the guerilla that they were working for an international GBC and that the Colombians were happy in the temples. Only few insiders know that ISKCON bombed their own temple by mistake. Fortunately there were no devotees inside the temple at the time of explosion.
We still keep the same name "ISKCON Colombia", which I registered and still hope that the GBC understands one day that we do not belong in a quarantine, that we still love them and Srila Prabhupada and all other Vaishnavas as well, and that our deep friendship with many Gaudiya Math saints and the World Vaishnava Association is a chance to have an umbrella platform to deal with issues which may concern everyone.
We have our own style of preaching, more indigenous than western, and like to sing our bhajans in the local languages as well. But we really feel all devotees deserve to be given the benefit of the doubt, much more than the two minute calls that you ask for. Honest inquiry is necessary, speaking heart to heart. We need less ecclesiastical concerns and more love and welfare for all.
Yes, my dear Hridayananda Maharaj. It is nice to meet you in the quarantine department. How many things have our brothers gone through here and have lost their hope? Have we done enough to bring them back?
I am waiting since 1984 for any GBC member to come to speak sense and vision to me. But unfortunately no one has come.
I meet some of them on some occasions and visit others regularly. It happens more or less unnoticed. Jayadvaita Maharaja, Radhanath Maharaja, Lokanath Maharaja, Satsvarupa Maharaja, Bir Krishna Maharaja. They nod and smile. Sometimes they say: "Paramadvaiti Maharaja, we agree with almost everything you say". But they never come back to me with any progressive ideas. I know that they are all busy gurus. It's good for them. But I guess they do not know how it feels to be unjustly called and treated as a traitor to Srila Prabhupada during all these years.
I am an insignificant little soul, not even a devotee, a newcomer to this path of divine love and mercy. I just cannot swallow that two plus two should be five. I humbly beg all of you to consider that Gaudiya Math, ISKCON, Bhaktivedanta Charity Trust, etc. are only names and that we are the living members. It is more important to care of the soul and not bricks and to accommodate everyone in this great family of Krishna Consciousness. Include, include and do not exclude unless there is no other choice. And even then try the rescue who ever can be rescued. Mercy is above justice. Is this not what Nityananda prabhu and Vasudeva Datta have taught us with their example?
We got our intelligence to apply it properly and for that we need some guidelines but most of all we need freedom. You, Hridayananda Maharaja, claimed this freedom by creating Krishna West. Svarupa Damodara Maharaja claimed it organizing international science meetings and a Manipuri Dance Tour, or others did it by going back to universities. There are so many examples.
Let us do what is needed to make ISKCON and the whole Gaudiya family a house where everyone can live happily. Are you ready? If so, then let us talk about it.
Maybe the last GBC mistake is the starting point for a new reflection. I love you all anyway. It is up to you at what distance that love of mine will be situated. I am a strong speaker sometimes and write terrible English. Forgive me please. Many of you know me better. I wish I could hug you all.
Hare Krishna.
Dasanudasah
B.A. Paramadvaiti
