Chapter 30 – Deception in Dubai & the Letter That Never Was

(1970s Madras)

(Pārtha-sārathi Temple, Madras)

The ISKCON temple was nestled in the quiet residential neighbourhood of Kilpauk, and Mahārāja was immediately struck by the British colonial-style architecture that lined the streets. The temple itself was no exception. It was a spacious bungalow with lofty ceilings and had been rented by the temple presidents, Bhavabhūti Dāsa and Śravaṇānanda Dāsa. Mahārāja knew Śravaṇānanda from their days preaching together in Daytona Beach in 1972 and had even recommended him for his first initiation. Yet upon arriving at the temple, he learned that his old friend was away for several months, and Bhavabhūti was in charge.

Mahārāja explained to Bhavabhūti that Haṁsadūta Swami had sent him, and had told him that Bhavabhūti would help him get his permit to visit the Andamans. Bhavabhūti shrugged, wearing the smile of a man reluctantly agreeing to haul a grand piano up three flights of stairs. “Yeeeeeah, I mean, I can help you get a permit to the Andamans if you want…”
Mahārāja immediately sensed a ‘but’ hanging in the air, and, sure enough, he was right.
“…but do you really want to be on Haṁsadūta’s party?” Bhavabhūti asked.
Mahārāja was a little taken aback. “Well, the Nitāi-Gaura World Travelling Saṅkīrtana Party sounds pretty sweet to me!”
Bhavabhūti chuckled. “The Nitāi-Gaura World Travelling Saṅkīrtana Party – it’s a big name, but in the end, that’s all it is – a big name.” Then he fixed Mahārāja with a sceptical stare. “Mahārāja, how well do you really know Haṁsadūta?” he asked.
He had to admit that, being in Africa for so many years, he didn’t know much – he had taken sannyāsa with him, had a few dealings with him in Vṛndāvana, knew that he was a bit of a maverick, and that he had been remarkably successful in preaching in Germany, where the Hare Kṛṣṇas were generally disliked by the civic authorities. Bhavabhūti noted and appreciated Haṁsadūta’s preaching, but still went on to regale Mahārāja with a lengthy list of Haṁsadūta’s unsavoury traits and questionable dealings with the devotees. Finally, he told him, “‘Maverick’ would be a nice word to use about Haṁsadūta; others might say he’s like a hurricane – totally uncontrollable, to the point of being dangerous!”

Despite having heard all this from Bhāvabhūtī, Mahārāja still felt obliged to help Haṁsadūta – after all, he had borrowed $400 from him. Then Bhavabhūti came up with an alternative to the Andamans.

Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: Bhavabhūti wanted to go to the Middle East to collect to buy some saṅkīrtana vehicles for the Madras temple. He suggested we could both go to Dubai, stay there for a while, and then go our separate ways. I told him that I had heard that Oman had a big Indian community, so I could go there after Dubai. I thought it was a good idea, so I sent a telegram to Haṁsadūta in Vṛndāvana telling him that the Andaman permit would take a long time, and in the meantime, I could use his $400 dollars to go to Dubai and Oman, collect for his saṅkīrtana party, an meet him back in India with the money. A few days later, Haṁsadūta wrote back to me and agreed to the idea.

Mahārāja decided to call on Viṭṭalbhāi Patel, his old acquaintance who had once given a generous donation for Śrīla Prabhupāda. When he and Bhavabhūti arrived at Viṭṭalbhāi’s palatial residence in Dubai, Viṭṭalbhāi welcomed them both warmly. Mahārāja recounted how he had personally delivered Viṭṭalbhāi’s donation to Prabhupāda in Māyāpura, and how Prabhupāda had been very pleased to receive it.

True to his nature as a cultured Gujarati gentleman, Viṭṭalbhāi arranged a sumptuous lunch for his two guests. As they sat together at the dining table, eating puris and subji, conversing leisurely, the doorbell rang in the background. At first, they paid little attention – until the maid entered the room, followed closely by two other devotees. News had spread about the $12,000 donation that Viṭṭalbhāi had given to Prabhupāda, and as was often the case, once a life-member had given big, other devotees were quick to see if he could be milked for more. Tribhūvanātha Dāsa and Guṇārnava Dāsa had come to Dubai to collect for the gośālā at Kṛṣṇa-Balarāma Temple in Vṛndāvana. They were shocked to see Mahārāja and Bhavabhūti sitting at the dining table. The feeling was mutual, and an awkward silence hung in the air – the sort that precedes a saloon shoot-out in an old western. Seeing the obvious discomfort, Viṭṭalbhāi suddenly stood up and greeted his guests with a broad smile and a “Jaya Śrī Kṛṣṇa!” and told his maid to bring two more plates to the table.

Tribhūvanātha and Guṇārnava sat opposite Mahārāja and Bhavabhūti, while Viṭṭalbhāi began asking where they had come from. As their host carried on the conversation, Mahārāja and Bhavabhūti stared at the two newcomers across the dining table.
“How are things in Kṛṣṇa-Balarāma Temple?” a stony-faced Bhavabhūti asked.
There was a pause. “Fine,” replied Guṇārnava, equally deadpan.
As all four devotees continued to eat, trading steely glances between bites, and Viṭṭalbhāi continued making small-talk, the doorbell rang once again. A minute later the maid appeared in the doorway again, with a bemused smile on her face.
“Oh, you gotta be kidding me!” Mahārāja blurted out unconsciously as he saw two more devotees following her. Parivrajakācārya Swami was collecting for his preaching in Iran; Rājaśekhara Dāsa was collecting for the Deities in Vṛndāvana. Another embarrassing silence ensued. Once again, Viṭṭalbhāi was the perfect host, and requested more plates to be brought for his new guests.

After prasādam, the devotees gathered in one room and immediately a heated discussion broke out. Each group insisted that their service to Prabhupāda was top priority. Tribhūvanātha and Guṇārnava maintained that Prabhupāda wanted a gośālā in Vṛndāvana. Rājaśekhara argued that funds were urgently required for the Deity department there. Parivrajakācārya Swami pressed the importance of spreading Kṛṣṇa consciousness in an Islamic country, while Bhavabhūti insisted that in order to build the Madras temple he needed saṅkīrtana buses to collect. At last, all eyes turned toward Mahārāja, waiting to hear his claim.

Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: I was just sitting there, listening to all of them arguing – they all had important services which needed money, and in one sense, my collecting for Haṁsadūta’s saṅkīrtana party was pretty negligible in comparison. Then I said, “Well, I cultivated Viṭṭalbhāi and made him a member. He’s my contact, and I was here first!” Nobody could really say anything to that, because it was true. Then I made a suggestion – “Well, guys, we’re gonna have to divide up the turf.” So we made a plan – I would stay and collect in Dubai and Oman, Bhavabhūti would go to Qatar, Parivrajakācārya and Rājaśekhara would go to Kuwait, and Tribhūvanātha and Guṇārnava would go to Bahrain.

For the next few days, the six devotees stayed at Viṭṭalbhāi’s house, making plans for their respective destinations. Bhavabhūti accompanied Mahārāja to the Omani embassy, where Mahārāja applied for a visa and was told to return in ten days.

During this period, while speaking with Guṇārnava, Mahārāja received the shocking news that his long-time friend, Puṣṭa-Kṛṣṇa Swami, had stepped down from his service as Śrīla Prabhupāda’s secretary and GBC for South Africa. Renouncing his sannyāsa vows, he had returned to the United States to pursue a career in medicine. The news left Mahārāja mortified. Although his relationship with Puṣṭa-Kṛṣṇa had seen its ups and downs, Mahārāja had always regarded him as both a friend and a mentor.
Now, Mahārāja couldn’t help but wonder about the situation in South Africa. Reports had reached him that the yātrā had only a handful of devotees remaining and that the temple was $40,000 in debt to the BBT. Brahmānanda Swami had been blacklisted by the South African government and could not enter the country, so given his long-standing involvement there, Mahārāja felt duty-bound to write to Śrīla Prabhupāda, asking whether he should return to support the devotees there.

Despite the discouraging news about Puṣṭa-Kṛṣṇa, Mahārāja resolved to carry on with the purpose that had brought him to Dubai. He visited some of Viṭṭalbhāi’s business associates, enrolled new members, collected donations, and spoke from the Bhagavad-gītā.

While staying at Viṭṭalbhāi Patel’s home, Mahārāja and the devotees noticed a large stack of Back to Godhead magazines in the living room. As a life member of ISKCON, Viṭṭalbhāi regularly received the magazine along with other new publications. The devotees eagerly sat down and began reading the books, while Mahārāja reached into the middle of the stack, pulled out a copy of Back to Godhead, and began to leaf through its pages.

Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: I picked up this one magazine, and there was an article by Prabhupāda and I started reading it. I looked at the other devotees and said, “Wow! There’s an article here by Prabhupāda – he’s quoting Caitanya-caritāmṛta, where Lord Caitanya is calling Vallabhācārya a prostitute. It’s pretty heavy!” Now Viṭṭalbhāi was a follower of Vallabhācārya, so I told the devotees, “Maybe we should just pull this one out and take it with us.”

But Guṇārnava said, “No, maybe if he hears it from the pure devotee, he’ll accept it.” Then, right at that moment, Viṭṭalbhāi’s wife called us for prasādam, so I raised up a five inch stack of magazines, stuck that copy in there, and left it, thinking, “Let fate be his guide!”

Eventually, we all left for our different destinations and about two months later, when we were back in India, this bombastic thirty-page letter was sent to Prabhupāda. What had happened is that Viṭṭalbhāi had started looking through the Back To Godhead magazines and had read that article. There were more than thirty magazines there to choose from, but he looked at that one! Pure devotee or no pure devotee – he was furious! So he wrote a thirty-page complaint to Prabhupāda. He also wrote to Sumati Moraji – the lady who had given Prabhupāda a free ticket on the Jaladuta – she was also a Vallabha. He also wrote to the head of the Vallabha maṭha in Udaipur, and he sent them all excerpts from the article where Mahāprabhu calls Vallabhācārya a prostitute.

So a series of things happened then – one is that Prabhupāda received Viṭṭalbhāi’s thirty-page complaint letter. The other thing is Prabhupāda received a ten-page complaint letter from Sumati Morarji. Then, the head of the Vallabha maṭha at Udaipur sent a letter to all their congregation, and told them to spread the word that any Vallabha who is a member of ISKCON should tear up their life-membership card and never go to an ISKCON temple again.

Prabhupada didn’t even write back to Viṭṭalbhāi, but he did write a short letter back to Sumati Morarji, with a Xerox copy of that section from Caitanya-caritāmṛta, and he explained that Mahāprabhu said this to Vallabha in a friendly way with a smile on His face.

Only one person came to the temple in Bombay with the letter from the Vallabhacarya maṭha telling all their congregation to tear up their membership cards, and he said, “What’s this crazy stuff all about?” Not a single person did that! Nobody tore up their membership cards.

Then, about three weeks later, the CBI raided the maṭha in Udaipur and dug out two interesting things – piles of black money from the mattresses of the ācāryas and the pūjārīs, and a whole bunch of Playboy magazines – a bunch of nude pictures.

(Back to Godhead Magazine, October, 1975)

(The article dealing with Vallabhācārya)

Eventually, the other devotees staying in Viṭṭalbhāi’s house left to collect in Kuwait and Bahrain. When it was Bhavabhūti’s time to leave for Qatar, Mahārāja accompanied him to the airport and bid him farewell.

Five days later, Mahārāja returned to the Omani embassy to collect his passport and visa. As he walked away from the desk, flipping through the pages, he was puzzled to find no visa inside. He walked back and said to the clerk, “I think there’s been a mistake – there’s no Omani visa in my passport.”
The clerk checked his register, nodded, and replied matter-of-factly, “No mistake – your friend who was with you that day came back about an hour after you left. He told us you’d had an accident and asked us to cancel your visa.”
Mahārāja couldn’t believe what he had just heard and pressed the clerk to be sure. The man only nodded in confirmation. Stepping back out into the heavy warmth of the Dubai air, Mahārāja’s head was spinning. Why would Bhavabhūti do such a thing? It made no sense. In a daze, he climbed back into his taxi and returned to Viṭṭalbhāi’s house.

About twenty minutes from their destination, Mahārāja noticed an Indian teenager standing by the roadside with his thumb out, trying to hitch a ride. He asked the taxi driver to pull over and invite the boy in. The youth, about eighteen years old and carrying a backpack, climbed into the car and mentioned where he was headed. Mahārāja instructed the driver to drop him off on the way.
When he reached his spot, the boy got ready to step out, he smiled and said, “Thank you. Hare Kṛṣṇa!”
Mahārāja did a double take. “Hare Kṛṣṇa! Where are you from?”
The boy replied cheerfully, “I’ve come to visit my uncle here, but my family lives in Oman. Right now, Mr.Bhavabhūti-jī is staying at our house there. We’re having very nice programs – he’s making good collect with all the Hindu families there!”

The boy waved goodbye as the taxi drove off, but Mahārāja didn’t see him. He simply sat in the backseat, stunned.

Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: For some devotees, it was perfectly acceptable to just cheat each other. After all, “It’s all for devotional service, right?” Bhavabhūti messed things up for me – obviously, he didn’t want to go to Qatar because he didn’t know what to expect there. But he knew from me that there were Indians in Oman, so he went there, made a ton of money, and then, when he got back to Bombay he got screwed by Gopāla-Kṛṣṇa. Somehow or other, Gopāla-Kṛṣṇa pressured him into depositing the money he collected with the BBT for ‘safekeeping’, and when Bhavabhūti wanted it back, Gopāla-Kṛṣṇa told him, “Well, we have more pressing things to take care of besides getting you some saṅkīrtana vehicles.” So then Bhavabhūti falsified some papers and transferred his money directly from the BBT account in Bombay to some account in Madras, then he flew back to Madras on a Sunday night, went to the bank on Monday morning and withdrew all the cash. He knew that Gopāla-Kṛṣṇa couldn’t go after it, and he wasn’t gonna take him to court – it was all internal wrangling. It was a circus!

Just a few days before leaving Dubai, Mahārāja received a reply from Śrīla Prabhupāda. As he carefully opened the envelope, he wondered whether Prabhupāda had agreed to his proposal to return and assist the struggling South African yātrā. But the reply he found was not at all what he expected.

(The Letter that Mahārāja received from ‘Prabhupada’)

My Dear Jagat Guru Maharaja,

Please accept my blessings. I am in receipt of your letter dated September 28, 1976, I have noted the contents carefully.

I understand from Hansadutta Maharaja that you have gone to Dubai borrowing $400.00 dollars from him. So if you want to change your programme again, at least send this money back to him.

In the last year you have changed your engagement so many times, it is not good, better to stick to something and complete it than constantly changing. If you can carry out your original plan of collecting from Indian in different parts of the world and sending to India that would be good. Why not stick with Nitai Gaura TWSKP and make this successful?

I hope this letter finds you well.

Your ever well-wisher,
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami

Mahārāja perused the letter carefully. There was something about it that just didn’t seem right.

Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: I was looking at it and thinking, “What’s wrong with this letter?” Then I looked down at the bottom – Prabhupāda always had his secretary type their initials – and the initials were H.D.S – ‘Haṁsadūta Swami.’ It turns out that after Puṣṭa-Kṛṣṇa blooped, Haṁsadūta became Prabhupāda’s secretary.

The letter said, “You should stop changing your program, pay back the $400 you owe Haṁsadūta and stick with the Nitai-Gaura World Travelling Sankirtana Party” – it was all about Haṁsadūta! It didn’t address anything that I had brought up in my letter about the situation in South Africa. Haṁsadūta was just worried that I would run off to South Africa with his money!

Years later, in the 1980s, I went to the Bhaktivedanta Archive and found the original letter that I had written to Śrīla Prabhupāda. So, Prabhupāda would sometimes dictate a whole letter, or he would tell his secretary to write a short reply back to that person. In the margin of my letter, the secretary had written Prabhupāda’s response – “Yes, can do if he wants.” In other words, “Yes, he can go back to South Africa if he wants.”

In the morning, all the letters would be read to Prabhupāda, then typed up, and at around 4:30 or so, they would bring all the typed replies back, and Prabhupāda would just sign them all. So I figured that Haṁsadūta had written his own letter on Prabhupāda’s letterhead, and put it in the stack for Prabhupāda to sign. It made me wonder later how many other letters from ‘Prabhupāda’ were sent to devotees by Haṁsadūta!

There were a few people around Prabhupāda who were of bad character. There was a whole side of the Hare Kṛṣṇa movement which was no different than a gang – that was the ‘big boys,’ with their big macho thing. There was this big competitive mood of serving Prabhupāda in a very mundane way, like a bunch of soccer teens competing for the cup. It was far from what one would expect from a group of monks!

Mahārāja reflected on the recent upheavals – Puṣṭa-Kṛṣṇa’s departure, Bhavabhūti’s scheming, and Haṁsadūta’s deception. He could have tried to secure another visa for Oman, but he felt no real obligation to Haṁsadūta beyond repaying the $400 – and by now he had completely lost interest in joining his so-called Travelling Saṅkīrtana Party. Lacking the funds to return to South Africa, he resolved instead to go back to India and await the direction of Prabhupāda and Kṛṣṇa.

In early November, Mahārāja landed in Bombay. Arriving at the Juhu temple, he was warmly greeted at the gate by Acyutānanda Swami. Within ISKCON, Acyutānanda was a well-known figure: one of the earliest devotees to accompany Prabhupāda to India in 1967, fluent in Bengali and Hindi, and celebrated for his mastery of Bengali-style kīrtana learned at the maṭha of Prabhupāda’s godbrother, Śrīla B.R. Śrīdhara Mahārāja. A New Yorker by birth, he had a high IQ and was also a rapid-fire talker. Though his initial welcome was cordial, it wasn’t long before he remarked with characteristic bluntness, “Y’know, too many swamis in one place – not good! I was staying in Hyderabad for a while and they need a sannyāsī now. You should go there!”

And taking Acyutānanda Swami’s advice, Mahārāja immediately booked himself a train ticket to Hyderabad…