Winter 2003/4
Readers of our first issue of Back To Prabhupada will recall the prophetic warning we quoted from Srila Prabhupada in relation to the bizarre activities, tyrannical behaviour and subsequent fall-down of one of ISKCON's 80 unauthorised Gurus:
"But sometimes, if a spiritual master is not properly authorized and only on his own initiative becomes a spiritual master, he may be carried away by an accumulation of wealth and large numbers of disciples."
(Nectar of Devotion, Chapter 14).
Here we not only present another amazing example of this, but also show how the whole Governing Body Commission of ISKCON (GBC) shamelessly tried to cover up these nefarious activities. The following was an announcement made by the GBC, regarding one of their unauthorised 'voted-in' Gurus:
STATEMENT ISSUED BY:
Badrinarayana Dasa Adhikary,
ISKCON Governing Body Commission (GBC),
Acting Chair of the GBC Executive Committee.
July 14, 1998
The Executive Committee of the ISKCON Governing Body Commission (GBC) regrets to inform ISKCON and its supporters that Harikesa Swami, aged 49, has recently suffered a serious physical and mental collapse.
It is not unusual that ISKCON leaders, when vigorously preaching Krsna consciousness even up to old age, follow the footsteps of great acaryas and tend to become aloof from bodily concerns. Consequently, leading preachers are sometimes afflicted suddenly with ailments that severely limit their ability to continue at their accustomed pace. In such cases, "slowing down" is not a sign of "giving up." Rather, it shows that a "long-term" vision can give a spiritual leader many extra years to preach Krsna consciousness.
Harikesa Maharaja's crisis resulted from an enormous overburden of work, the flare-up of many long-standing physical maladies and a fully committed attitude toward preaching. This attitude caused him to accept many more responsibilities than he could reasonably take on, especially in his weakened condition. We dearly love him and devotees should all intensely pray for his swift recovery. However, it will be some time before he can resume his preaching work. He is regularly meeting with godbrothers and disciples and is in excellent medical care.
This statement was nonsense from beginning to end, not least because straight after it was made, Harikesa decamped in excellent health with his massage therapist and bags of cash in tow. He acquired a stunning Villa in the French Riviera, which he has recently been advertising for sale for an astonishing US$1.2 million at the current exchange rate. (However, readers will be pleased to know that he has now brought down the price to a more manageable US $1.07 million - so anyone interested in buying the property can check it out for themselves at: www.iskconirm.com/docs/webpages/french-property.htm - the vendor's details are those of Harikesa).
Readers may well wonder how on earth the resources to purchase such a Villa could be hidden from ISKCON's managerial body, the GBC. Especially when this Guru of theirs was a sannyasi, a renunciant who had taken vows of poverty and chastity.
It is clear now that this carefully crafted communique to the ISKCON community was a GBC ploy to cover up Harikesa's imminent departure from ISKCON with minimal embarrassment to themselves. At the time, Harikesa had thousands of disciples and controlled vast swathes of ISKCON in Europe. Aside from the fact that the GBC statement was a fabrication, it was also an affront to Srila Prabhupada and the predecessor acaryas (saintly Gurus in our line). It is not that "great acaryas tend to become aloof from bodily concerns"; the fact is that they are not even living under material conditions, being completely liberated souls. So for Badrinarayana to compare the unauthorized 'Riviera Guru' Harikesa to "the great acaryas" like Srila Prabhupada was a great offense. Indeed, bodily ailments and physical age do not affect the authorized, bona fide acarya. It is hugely ironic that this false comparison should have been made since it was rejected by Srila Prabhupada in a conversation he personally had with Harikesa himself:
| Harikesa: | Now you just have to become better, more healthy. |
| Srila Prabhupada: | Healthy? I have nothing to do with this body. |
(Conversation 77-10-10)
It is therefore very clear that Harikesa's "serious physical and mental collapse" was just a cover-up story by the GBC, part of their on going programme of deception and disinformation to keep their unauthorized Guru business intact.
What is even more shocking is that the 'Goebells' team led by Badrinarayana Das which was behind this disgraceful cover-up for the "great acarya" Harikesa, are still on the GBC, running ISKCON to this very day!
Indeed, not only was Harikesa "carried away by an accumulation of wealth" as described in Srila Prabhupada's quote above, but it is now clear that he carried away an accumulation of wealth!
- thus confirming Prabhupada's statement that such a Guru was never authorised to be a Guru in the first place.