Back To Prabhupada, Issue 3, Spring 2004
Since launching Back To Prabhupada (BTP) magazine, one thing has become patently clear: most general, rank and file devotees in ISKCON are sincere and want the truth. The current Guru hoax can only survive so long as such innocent devotees are kept in the dark by ISKCON's dishonest leadership. Yet how to reach them? With this challenge in mind a daring plan was hatched to distribute BTPs in Mayapur, the birthplace of Lord Chaitanya and the world headquarters of ISKCON, during the Gaura Purnima festival (the celebration of the appearance of Lord Chaitanya). Such a course of action was potentially rife with danger, since previously IRM devotees have been put in hospital by resident Mayapur 'devotees' for attempting to preach the truth there. But for the sake of spreading the truth about Srila Prabhupada's glories we felt compelled to at least try. What follows is an account of how, by Krishna's unlimited mercy, the plan succeeded beyond all odds and expectations.
To attempt to distribute the magazines inside the grounds of ISKCON Mayapur would, of course,have been practically suicidal, and yet we knew this was where thousands of devotees would be spending most of the festival. However, one of the festival organisers informed us that many devotees would be going on the Mayapura parikrama (a walk to various places of pilgrimage), and that this would give us a window of opportunity to pass out BTPs. Since the parikrama is in a public place, it would be harder for the Mayapur management to employ their usual thuggery and violence. There were major problems, however. The parikrama party was to be ringed by police, security guards as well as many ISKCON 'leaders' - the Gurus, sannyasis etc. - who we knew would stop us on sight. The trick then was to somehow distribute the magazines without being seen! Yet how was this possible?
Our distributors stood pensively waiting at 4.30 a.m. in front of the birth place of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, fully laden with hundreds of Back To Prabhupada magazines. At 6.30 a.m. the parikrama party arrived at the site, and began to sit down for a talk. The distributors saw the senior sannyasis, the police and security. They knew that as soon as they started handing out the magazine they would be seen, and no doubt physically removed. Then something miraculous occurred. Just as they started handing out the magazine a thick, heavy fog descended on the whole area. This allowed the distributors to weave amongst the sitting pilgrims unseen. By the time the fog had cleared, 248 devotees had willingly received a copy of BTP.
One of the leaders of Mayapur, Bhakti Purusottama Swami, suddenly realised what was going on and began bellowing at the police - "Arrest them! Arrest them!" - pointing to the magazine distributors. The police approached the distributors and told them to stop what they were doing. Bhakti Purusottama Swami was not satisfed with just stopping them, he wanted them arrested. One policeman asked: "Arrested for doing what exactly?" Another policemen looked at the magazine and said: "The front cover has a picture of your Guru on it, what's so bad about that?" The police concluded that they were doing nothing wrong and so could not be arrested. The temple commander of Mayapur then asked all the devotees to hand their magazines back to him saying: "You should not read this." But no-one took any notice! When they got back to the Mayapur Chandradoya Mandira (temple), Jayapataka Swami (one of the original eleven Guru hoaxers) desperately pleaded with the devotees to throw the magazines "in the trash". This request was also ignored!
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With this success under our belts the plan moved to the second phase. It was known that when the Gaura Purinima festival ended, all the devotees would leave either via the airport or train station in Calcutta. So our distributors camped out at these places from early morning to late evening, and gave out magazines to the many parties of devotees as they left. Amazingly, following the parikrama incident, word had got around about the magazine, and many devotees actually approached the distributors asking for copies! The Chief Security Offcer of Calcutta Airport saw what was happening, and after he read the magazine became so inspired that he allowed us to store two large boxes of BTPs in his personal office.
Predictably, not everyone was happy with our efforts, and when the Mayapur devotees found out what was happening they brought the police to arrest the distributors. Once again they struggled to come up with the name of the crime we were meant to be committing, settling eventually on: 'hawking without a licence'. But when it was pointed out that the magazines were being handed out free of charge, again they were stuck. Humiliated by their inability to stop BTP being distributed, the Mayapur devotees then decided to play dirty.
The next day they came in force and threatened the distributors with violence if they did not stop. But our distributors were undaunted, and continued fearlessly with the task in hand, distributing the truth.
In the space of just a few days over 1100 international devotees received a copy of Back To Prabhupada! (see table below). This was all due to Krishna's mercy in assisting us to bring ISKCON 'Back to Prabhupada'.
Srila Prabhupada ki jai!
The Details of BTP Distribution Mayapur Festival 2004 -
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