Ācārya Siṁha
The Life of Swami Bhakti Gaurava Narasiṅgha Mahārāja
Chapter 32
“Our Jagat-Guru Swami Knows the Philosophy”
(Hyderabad Farm – December, 1976)
New Naimiṣāraṇya farm was a 565 acre property, an hour and half drive outside of Hyderabad in the town of Medchal. It had been donated to ISKCON by Mr Hari Prasada Badruka, a wealthy businessman, and was one of the biggest farms in the movement at that time. Śrīla Prabhupāda wanted this farm to become ISKCON’s first varṇāśrama project, and his hope was to draw local villagers to come and stay there, take up Kṛṣṇa consciousness, and start a devotee community.
Śrīla Prabhupāda was scheduled to go to New Naimiṣāraṇya at midday on December 6th. Before that however, he went on his usual morning walk with his disciples.
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: I remember that morning walk – there were about ten of us. It was early in the morning, about six o’clock, and it was a full moon. As the sun was coming up You could still see the moon in the sky. At one point, Prabhupāda stopped, pointed at the moon with his stick and said, “My Guru Mahārāja went to the moon for preaching.” We were all quiet, sort of stunned, and then he said, “Sometime before his disappearance, he said that the residents on the moon have become degraded. They have forgotten Kṛṣṇa, so our Guru Mahārāja has gone to the moon for preaching Kṛṣṇa consciousness.”
Many years later, I heard the same thing from a disciple of Sarasvatī Ṭhākura, that he had said, “The people on the moon planet have become materialistic, so we must go there and preach!”
When Prabhupāda arrived at New Naimiṣāraṇya with his entourage, his room was still under construction. In the meantime, Mahāṁsa Swami had cleared out a small storage room – normally used for keeping grains and occasionally as a sleeping space for the brahmacārīs – and prepared it for Śrīla Prabhupāda to stay.
After settling into his room, Prabhupāda was taken around the farm by Mahāṁsa, who showed him the progress being made by the devotees. Prabhupāda expressed his general satisfaction. He had earlier instructed Mahāṁsa to organise a series of pāṇḍal programs for the surrounding villages starting on December 8th, and Mahāṁsa, along with Acyutāsgraja, one of the local brahmacārīs on the farm, had already begun making the arrangements. At the same time, devotees led by Rāma Śraddhā Dāsa went from village to village by bullock-cart, performing kīrtana and announcing the forthcoming pāṇḍal program.
The next morning, Śrīla Prabhupāda went for his morning walk accompanied by his disciples. During the walk, Mahāṁsa told Prabhupāda about their land, what was growing there etc. and Prabhupāda enthused his disciples, giving ideas how they could attract the locals to become devotees. He also spoke briefly about the moon.
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: During the walk, the moon came up again and Prabhupāda said that according to the scientists, the moon was ‘full of dust’ and I replied, “Yes, because their brains are full of dust!” Prabhupāda smiled and said, “Yes, their going to the moon is all a bluff!” Then Prabhupāda came up with a theory – that the moon is a fiery planet covered in ice. He said it was fiery like the sun, but it was covered with a layer of thick ice, therefore it had a cooling effect. Then he stopped walking, turned and smiled, and asked us, “So? What do you think of my theory?” Everyone went, “JAYA!” Honestly, if Prabhupāda had told us that the moon was made of green cheese we’d have all believed him! But I think this was just his poke at the scientists – “You have your theory, I have mine. You say the moon is made of dust; I say the moon is a fiery planet covered in ice!”
Now on another plane, I don’t think so, there is no ice around there. It’s not a fiery planet, it’s cold. In one sense, whatever it is, is beyond our knowing, but it’s not beyond the knowing of some people. They say they’ve gone there; they say they’ve sent their probes there. Although it was adamantly refuted for years, later Prabhupāda said, “Oh, they may have gone” We had been out there, banging the scientist’s door down, so we were like, “But Prabhupāda, you said they didn’t go!”
Prabhupāda said, “They say there is no God – I say they didn’t go to the moon!”
So, I was always curious because my father was in the space program and those astronauts were friends of our family. My father would go out in the ocean in big ships and pick these guys up when they would come down from the atmosphere. So if they were just making the whole thing up in the desert somewhere, I figured they must have totally hoodwinked about fifty-thousand military personnel. They were doing something somewhere. Of course, what Prabhupāda said that day, we were ready to go to the rug with any scientist of the world. We would be out the next day declaring, “The moon definitely has got a layer of ice around it and it’s burning like the sun!” Sometimes I wonder if Śrīla Prabhupāda said that just to see us dance.
Anyhow, there were these big rocks all over our land at the farm – huge ones – and Mahāṁsa told Prabhupāda about an old rock-temple which was near our property. It was a Narasiṁhadeva temple and you had to crawl inside an opening in the rock to see the Deity. I was on a bit of a roll because Prabhupāda had given a favourable response to my last statement about the scientists having dust for brains, so as we were walking we approached a huge rock ,and I said, “The government is making so much propaganda for people to work hard, so they should come and make a nice temple from this rock.”
This time, Prabhupāda didn’t even look at me. He just said, “You show the example and they will see,” and carried on walking.
That morning, after breakfast, I returned to the rock and just sat there, chanting, and thinking, “Okay, what am I supposed to do? Is this an instruction from the guru? I don’t know how to do this.”
Eventually I figured that Prabhupāda would probably want my energy used for better things than banging that rock with a hammer and making it into a temple, but his point was, “Don’t just talk – be the example yourself!” But on that particular day I wasn’t quite sure…
At one point, there was some talk about how the devotees at the farm could be self-sufficient and I mentioned, “Perhaps the devotees on the farm can make some pottery. We can get some potter’s wheels and make clay pots.”
Prabhupāda stopped and looked at me, “What for? Pottery is very cheap here. We are not simply interested in crafts. We are interested in the main necessities of life so we can chant Hare Kṛṣṇa.”
Because there were no Deities at the farm, the morning program was simple – there was a small maṅgala-ārati, a morning walk with Śrīla Prabhupāda, guru-pūjā, and Śrīmad Bhāgavatam class.
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: Śrīla Prabhupāda was so pleased with the farm that he told us, “All the householders in Los Angeles should immediately move to this farm – they can all have three acres of land and keep some cows.” Of course, that never happened. Except for one devotee, nobody came from LA. The devotees in LA don’t have much experience with land, cows, or anything organic unless it comes from Trader Joe’s.
Maybe the Hyderabad farm reminded Prabhupāda of Vṛndāvana – you could clearly see that Prabhupāda relished the simplicity of rural life. When he was there, he said jokingly, “I am so happy here living near the earth. In New York, they want me to live in a pigeon-hole 750 feet in the air!” Actually, he was very happy sitting there on the top of that building on 53rd Street in New York – he called that building a ‘jewel’ because it was in such a good location in Manhattan. But at the same time, he referred to it as ‘a pigeonhole’ because he was on the 11th floor of that building with just a little window, and the pigeons would come and sit on his windowsill. In comparison, he was much happier at the farm in Hyderabad.
There was a banyan tree near the buildings and he spent most of his time sitting under it. There was a raised platform around it with a small Hanumān shrine that was already there when we got the property. Prabhupāda would sit under that tree for guru-pūjā, for class, for prasādam, and in the afternoon, he would sometimes rest there.
Every morning, there was guru-pūjā, but so many things were not at all in order. The vyāsāsana was broken, the brass was never clean, the pūjārī was not very expert – but generally, Śrīla Prabhupāda did not see any of these things. He was completely absorbed in the simplicity of the farm – the land, the trees, the water…
(Śrīla Prabhupāda resting under a tree in Hyderabad, 1976)
However, the next morning after the walk, Mahārāja hurried to a nearby lake to bathe and return in time for guru-pūjā. When he came back, he saw Prabhupāda standing by the banyan tree, shouting at the devotees, who were all petrified. When Prabhupāda returned from his walk and approached the banyan tree to accept guru-pūjā, something had caught his attention. In the evenings, the devotees generally took prasādam on the ground below the dais where Prabhupāda sat, and the buckets of prasādam were placed on the dais itself. That morning, as Prabhupāda came to sit down, he noticed yellow rice scattered here and there on the dais, along with a blob of old khicari that had congealed and hardened in the sun. “Why isn’t this clean? It is so dirty here, I cannot even sit down!” Prabhupāda shouted. All the devotees simply stood there in shock. “If you do not clean after eating, you are an animal!” Again, he repeated, “Why isn’t this clean? How you can have pūjā when the floor is so dirty? You are all rascals!”
Prabhupāda turned to Rāma Śraddhā, “Are you a Hindu or a Muslim? Cleanliness is next to godliness. What can I do? I am telling you but you don’t listen.”
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: Then, one devotee named Patita Uddharaṇa from 26 Second Avenue came forward and started to frantically scrape the khicari with a pocket knife. Prabhupāda shook his head and said, “First you’re completely negligent, now you’re a complete fanatic!”
He didn’t hear what Prabhupāda said. He thought Prabhupāda had said, “You’ll spoil the knife.” So he just stood up in front of Prabhupāda and said, “Oh, it’s okay Śrīla Prabhupāda. It’s just an old knife.”
That didn’t make any sense to what Prabhupāda had just said. Then Prabhupāda said, “Save it for your throat!”
About ten years later, I bumped into Patita Uddharaṇa and asked him, “Patita, do you still have that knife?”
He goes, “Yep!” And he pulled it out of his pocket.
Prabhupāda continued to chastise the devotees: “A brāhmaṇa uses water to clean. There are no brāhmaṇas here – only mlecchas!” Eventually, one of the devotees brought a bucket of water and cleaned the mess.
Suddenly, Prabhupāda noticed a western brahmacārī emerge from the bathroom, stagger into the bhoga room, and lock the door behind him. From the way he was walking and from his bedraggled appearance, it was obvious that he had just woken up and was going back to sleep again. “Who is that?” Prabhupāda asked Mahāṁsa, who was already cringing. “Bring him here!!” roared Prabhupāda.
Some of the devotees ran to the bhoga room and banged on the door. “Haribol! Prabhu! Open the door! Prabhupāda is calling you.”
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: All of a sudden this poor devotee comes out with his śikhā stuck up on top of his head, red creases across his face, and his sweat-shirt twisted halfway around. He was one of Haṁsadūta’s men from England. Everyone just gasped. We thought he would just disappear or something, because that day we were all experiencing Prabhupāda’s transcendental wrath. That devotee came and very humbly fell down in front of Śrīla Prabhupāda. Prabhupāda could understand that he wasn’t a very fixed-up devotee, but he asked, “Are you a devotee or a demon?”
The boy said, “A devotee, Śrīla Prabhupāda.
“What kind of devotee are you?”
He said, “I’m sick, Prabhupāda.”
“Yes, you’re sick, and when it’s time for prasādam” – and he made a gesture indicating a huge pile of prasādam – “you will be pleased to take.” Although it was time for guru-pūjā, no one could chant. Everyone was just stunned. Prabhupāda just looked around at everyone and said, “So?”
All of a sudden, I began singing, “Śrī guru-caraṇa-padma…” and we just started the ārati, and he sat back on the vyāsāsana looking at everybody.
Then we brought the Bhāgavatam for class – he put it aside and spoke from Bhagavad-gītā on the verse, pravṛttim ca nivṛttim ca – “the demons do not know what to do and what not to do. There are no good habits, no cleanliness and no truth about them.” He was especially emphasising cleanliness. He said if you’re not clean, Kṛṣṇa is ten million miles away.
Later that day, Mahāṁsa Swami spoke to Mahārāja about an idea he had in 1973. He wanted to start a ‘bullock-cart program.’ He envisioned a sannyāsī and a few brahmacārīs travelling through villages across India to preach Kṛṣṇa consciousness, distributing books and having kīrtana. Mahārāja was enthused about the idea and Mahāṁsa told him that if he was interested, he would provide Mahārāja with two carts, four bullocks, and a couple of devotees to accompany him.
Mahāṁsa Dāsa: We said, “Let’s make a trial.” So we thought of this, and I didn’t have money for it. Jagat-guru Swami agreed to finance it. Some Rs. 6000 was needed. He paid the money and we made the cart with four wheels and designed it and made it nice. Gopeśvara and Candrodaya and there were two other devotees. Four devotees all together started… We wanted to start it from the farm. We gave them a couple of boxes of magazines in Hindi, Telugu or whatever… Some books and magazines we gave. We planned it all. Jagat-guru Swami financed it, so he wanted to go with it.
Mahārāja immediately began making plans for painting the carts and adorning it with brass bells and other trimmings. He planned to paint the carts in bright colours, with large canopies in order that the devotees could sleep in them at night. They would have cooking facilities and storage space for books.
The next morning, there was another fiasco. As Prabhupāda sat on the vyāsāsana for guru-pūjā, he glanced toward the buildings and noticed a woman, one of the hired workers, entering the kitchen. He immediately turned to Mahāṁsa Swami and asked, “Who is that?”
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: You could tell by the way her hair was that she hadn’t bathed yet. Prabhupāda called her over and chastised her like anything for going into the kitchen without having a bath. Prabhupāda yelled at her in Hindi, but seeing that she didn’t understand, one of the devotees had to translate everything into Telugu. It was a heavy, heavy lesson about cleanliness. He was basically telling her that Indians have forgotten everything about their own culture.
After Prabhupāda dismissed the woman, the atmosphere was tense. Turning to Mahāṁsa Swami, he exclaimed, “Everything here is so dirty and untidy! Everything is a mess because the leadership is a mess!” Mahāṁsa was silent and finally motioned to Narasiṅgha Mahārāja to offer the guru-pūjā to Śrīla Prabhupāda. One of the devotees began singing Śrī-guru-caraṇa-padma, and just as Mahārāja finished blowing the conch three times, he glanced down at the ārati plate – only to realise that the bell was missing.
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: I was thinking, “Oh no, this day can’t get any worse!” I could have run to the kitchen to find the bell, but that would have caused a scene – the person offering guru-pūjā suddenly runs off! That would have made Prabhupāda even more angry. And what if the bell wasn’t even in the kitchen? Then I saw next to the tree there was this big brass bell that they would ring to let the devotees know that it was prasādam time. The thing was huge and you could just about pick it up with one hand. Anyhow, I grabbed it and started ringing it while offering the incense. As soon as Prabhupāda heard the sound of that big brass bell, he immediately turned his head – he looked at the bell in my hand, then he looked up at me with this piercing glance as if to say, “Are you serious? Because if you’re not…” I knew that if I smiled at him, he might think I was messing around, so I kept a straight face – the straightest face I ever kept in my whole life – and kept offering the incense.
That evening, about a thousand villagers attended the first pāṇḍal program, and it proved quite successful. The devotees hung a bed-sheet on one of the saṅkīrtana buses and screened a film titled The Hare Kṛṣṇa People. This was followed by a lecture on the Bhagavad-gītā and, finally, a roaring kīrtana in which most of the villagers joined. When Prabhupāda heard how the program had been so well-received by the locals, he was extremely pleased.
As word spread through the surrounding villages about the Hare Kṛṣṇa pāṇḍal program, the second night saw an even greater turnout. The second night, however, proved disastrous. That afternoon, Mahārāja and Mahāṁsa went to Hyderabad – Mahārāja to purchase items for his bullock cart, and Mahāṁsa had to finalise trust documents at the temple. By the time Mahārāja returned alone in the evening, the pāṇḍal program was drawing to a close, and the villagers’ expressions as they left told him that something had gone wrong.
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: I walked through the pāṇḍal to get to the brahmacārī āśrama, and saw that there were hundreds of leaf-plates of prasādam on the ground. You could see that some people had eaten a little and just left it! I thought, “God! What happened here?” Prabhupāda had stayed in his room all day, expecting that the managers were organising things nicely. Suddenly he called for Hari Śauri and asked him, “Bring me some of the prasādam,” so he brought him a plate of rice and dahl.
I had spent the whole day in Hyderabad, so I was about to take a bath. The next thing I know, Prabhupāda was on his porch, banging his cane on the ground calling for Mahāṁsa and the managers. One of the devotees, Mūrti Dāsa, who was an architect, saw Prabhupāda’s face and said, “He looked like Captain Bligh from ‘Mutiny on the Bounty.’”
I was a traveling sannyāsī, not one of the local managers, so I went to take a bath. Later, I saw Mūrti and Acyutāgraja coming out of Prabhupāda’s room and their faces were like ash. He told me what had happened.
When Mūrti and Acyutāgraja reached Prabhupāda’s room, he was with his secretary, Jagadīśa. On the desk in front of him was a leaf plate of coagulated rice and dahl. Prabhupāda’s first question to them was, “Where is Mahāṁsa?” They replied that he had gone to Hyderabad and had still not returned. Then Prabhupāda pointed to the plate of rice and dahl on his desk. “What is this?”
“It’s prasādam, Śrīla Prabhupāda,” Acyutāgraja replied.
Prabhupāda took the plate and threw it on the floor. “It is NOT prasādam! It is poison! It is not fit for dogs! We want to give people sumptuous prasādam and all we give is rice and dahl?”
Acyutāgraja muttered, “I’m sorry Śrīla Prabhupāda. I wasn’t given enough money to buy anything else.”
But Prabhupāda did not accept this as an excuse. “Why did you not come to Jagadīśa and get money?” he demanded. Then, turning to Jagadīśa, he asked, “Why did you not give him any money?” Jagadīśa was bewildered – he had no idea about the situation or that any money had been required at all.
Then Prabhupāda asked, “Who has cooked this?”
There was a pause until Mūrti replied, “One of the workers, Śrīla Prabhupāda.”
Prabhupāda’s eyes and mouth opened wide in shock, “A worker?? You allowed a worker to cook in my temple? Why?”
“There was an emergency – I had to go to one of the villages to get tools for the workers to finish your room,” Mūrti stammered, “There were no devotees left here to cook.”
Prabhupāda became even more angry, “No devotees?? I’m a devotee – you could have asked me to cook!”
Prabhupāda made it clear that he held everyone responsible, though his anger fell most heavily on Mahāṁsa. “This is his fault! He is gone for the whole day and he has neglected the pāṇḍal program here. He left nobody competent to cook. When I go to the temple, I am told he is at the farm. Now I am at the farm, I am told he is at the temple!” Prabhupāda had also heard that the kīrtana in the pāṇḍal was mediocre, the villagers walked around aimlessly, and the devotees showed little to no interest in preaching to them. The indigestible ‘prasādam’ was the crowning failure of the evening.
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: This was the second time that he had complained about the quality of the prasādam in the last few days – first in the Hyderabad temple, and then at the pāṇḍal program on the farm.
Later, I took a little of the rice and dahl. There was so much salt and chili in everything that the villagers couldn’t eat it. People from Andhra Pradesh are known for eating a lot of chili, but this was too much even for them. It was inedible by human standards – even a cow wouldn’t eat it. You would have to be starving to death to eat that stuff. So, the people tasted it and thought, “What the hell is this?” and they just walked off. In fact, I heard later that some dogs were sniffing at it and even they turned their noses up – they wouldn’t eat the stuff!
The following day was the disappearance of Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura, and Prabhupāda was scheduled to give class at 8:00 a.m. Acyutāgraja had already informed Mahāṁsa of the prasādam debacle when he returned at 11:00 the previous night, so when Prabhupāda called to see him at 6:30 that morning, he knew that a serious reckoning awaited him.
When he entered Prabhupāda’s room, he found Prabhupāda seated with some of his senior men – Haṁsadūta Swami, Tejiyas, Mūrti, Hari Śauri and Jagadīśa. Mahārāja sat at the back and simply observed the proceedings. Prabhupāda informed Mahāṁsa that he was not prepared to invest anything at the farm or the temple if the management continued to be so lax. “It has shocked my heart that you have allowed a sweeper to cook here, and then that was offered to Kṛṣṇa! When people hear that we allow a sweeper to cook, nobody will come. The standard is that only second initiated devotees can cook, and you have allowed a sweeper? Even after so long, you are still a mleccha!”
Prabhupāda continued reprimanding Mahāṁsa – “You have insulted me! I invited these villagers for prasādam and you have let me down. You have let me down. You have given them dog food!
Mahāṁsa had been unaware that Acyutāgraja and Mūrti had instructed the sweeper to cook, but as the temple president, Prabhupāda held him responsible. At the same time, Prabhupāda said that other senior men had been present at the pāṇḍal, but they had said nothing. “And what about all these big, big leaders over here? You think you are big leaders? What were you all doing here?”
Later, when Mahāṁsa tried to apologise, Prabhupāda cut him off – “It is not eatable even by the dogs! But you are less than the dogs if you prepare such thing. I was surprised. You allowed a sweeper to cook. We have distribution prasādam – not dog’s food. Such rascals are here. You do not know. I do not wish to discuss any more on this point. You have murdered the whole thing in two days! Now if possible, bring them, give them first-class prasādam, very palatable. Foodstuff means even one has no appetite, he’ll eat. That is food. Not that even one has got appetite, he’ll forget. That is not food. So do like that.”
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: Prabhupāda had already told Mahāṁsa that he wanted to move into his new room on the disappearance day of Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta. “On this auspicious day, the disappearance of my Guru Mahārāja, I must move in.” Everything was made ready, but the house was still not finished – they were still working on the roof and the windows. Prabhupāda didn’t care and he still moved in.
That morning, Prabhupāda gave class in his new room and had requested that his Guru Mahārāja’s picture be placed on the vyāsāsana. While Prabhupāda offered obeisances to the picture, I noticed that there was nowhere for Prabhupāda to sit and give class, so I immediately folded the wool chaddar that I was wearing and Prabhupāda sat on that.
Śrīla Prabhupāda spoke at length about his Guru Mahārāja and how he met him in Calcutta in 1922. Then Prabhupāda spoke about a poem that he had composed in English, honouring Sarasvatī Ṭhākura which had been published in The Harmonist magazine in 1935:
Adore, adore ye all the happy day
Blessed than heaven, sweeter than May.
When he appeared at Puri, the holy place,
My Lord and Master, His Divine Grace.
Oh! my Master, the evangelic angel.
Give us Thy light, light up Thy candle.
Struggle for existence, a human race.
The only hope, His Divine Grace.
Misled we are, all going astray,
Save us Lord, our fervent pray.
Wonder thy ways, to turn our face
Adore Thy feet, Your Divine Grace.
Forgotten Krishna, we fallen souls,
Paying most heavy, the illusion’s toll.
Darkness around, all untrace.
The only hope, His Divine Grace.
Message of service, thou hast brought,
A healthful life, as Chaitanya wrought.
Unknown to all, it’s full of brace.
That’s your gift, Your Divine Grace.
Absolute is sentient, thou hast proved
Impersonal calamity, thou hast moved.
This gives us a life, anew and fresh.
Worship Thy feet, Your Divine Grace.
Had you not come, who had told
The message of Krishna, forceful and bold.
That’s your right, you have the mace
Save me a fallen, Your Divine Grace.
The line of service, as drawn by you
Is pleasing and healthy, like morning dew.
The oldest of all, but in new dress
Miracle done, Your Divine Grace.
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: This was the first and only time he ever spoke about this, and it was recorded by Hari Śauri. He gave a purport to the meaning of this poem, and I distinctly remember that he brought out the significance of the phrase “Sweeter than May.” He said, “Because in your western country you have made this festival in May, and because my Guru Mahārāja was instructing me to go to the west.” He was explaining now this was a significant part of the poem in English and he was mentioning this season in the West it’s so sweet. So he spoke about three quarters of the verses and then he stopped and said that was all, thanked us, and then conducted the puṣpañjali. We all offered flowers, and there was a nice feast with sixty-four preparations.
(Śrīla Prabhupāda sitting under a tree at the Hyderabad farm, 1976)
Before midday, Śrīla Prabhupāda was to initiate four new disciples. He took his massage early and requested Hari Śauri to ask one of the sannyasīs to give a class to the initiates. When Hari Śauri went outside the first sannyāsī he came across was Mahārāja. “Śrīla Prabhupāda wants you to give a class to some of the new devotees.”
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: I gave class on Prabhupāda’s veranda. I always gave class on the same topic – the importance of accepting guru. That day was no exception, although I think the class was shorter than usual. Thirty-five years later, I got a letter from Hari Śauri who said, “Yes, I was sitting in the room and Prabhupāda listened to your class. Prabhupāda asked, ‘Who is speaking?’ I told him Jagat-Guru Swami, and when the class was over Prabhupāda was very pleased and said, ‘He is speaking very nicely. Our Jagat-Guru Swami knows the philosophy very well.’”
After the class, Prabhupāda went to sit under the banyan tree, followed by Hari Śauri who was holding three sets of beads. He said, “Prabhupāda is tired, so he wants you to chant on these beads for some new devotees.” I couldn’t believe it! That almost knocked me off of my feet! I went over to where Prabhupāda was sitting with the initiates, paid my obeisances, sat under the tree and chanted on the beads. I felt like I was a soldier carrying out the orders of a general. I was looking at Prabhupāda as I was chanting – I had no faith in my own ability to install the Holy Name on those beads, but he told me to do it, so I was just acting like and electrical conductor. Then I gave them back to Hari Śauri, Prabhupāda gave the beads to the initiates along with their spiritual names, and there was a fire yajña on Prabhupāda’s verandah.
The next day, Mahārāja went to see Prabhupāda who was sitting quietly in his room. Seeing Mahārāja at the door, he immediately invited him in with a bright smile and Mahārāja entered, offered obeisances and sat down. Prabhupāda asked him where he had been preaching and Mahārāja listed all the countries in the Middle-east and Africa where he had gone. Prabhupāda laughed and said, “Oh, you are Jagat-Guru!”
Mahārāja blushed and replied, “No, no – you are the real jagat-guru, Śrīla Prabhupāda. I am Jagat-Guru dāsa.”
Prabhupāda had noticed the two bullock-carts that Mahārāja was preparing and told him that in the 1950s, he also had a plan to go preaching with his bullock-carts in the villages, but this plan never happened because he could not get any financial support. Prabhupāda asked him where he intended to go with the carts and how he could sleep beneath the trees, bathe in lakes, and beg food from the village people in the mornings. He explained that this practice was called madhukārī and that sannyāsīs had sustained themselves in this way in ancient times. In the afternoon they could cook whatever food they had begged, offer it to Kṛṣṇa and in the evening they could hold a big kīrtana in the village and distribute prasādam.
Then Prabhupāda asked him, “And how long will you be gone for?”
After hearing Prabhupāda’s enthusiasm for the simple sannyāsī life, he hesitated.
“Er…I thought maybe one or two months, Śrīla Prabhupāda.”
Prabhupāda nodded. “Yes, that is good. Do not go longer than that. You should go on with your travelling and preaching.”
Just before leaving, Mahārāja gave Śrīla Prabhupāda a gift.
Narasiṅgha Mahārāja: Śrīla Prabhupāda had this nice wool chaddar that he liked, but while he was on a walk in Hyderabad, he sat down on a bench in the park which had wet paint on it. When he leaned back, the wool shawl got a little blue paint on it.
I knew that in a week or so, he was going to give a lecture at a Gītā conference in the āśrama of a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi in central India, and all these scholars were coming there. So I thought I’d buy a new wool shawl and give it to Prabhupāda.
But when I went to Hyderabad, I could only find a white wool chaddar, so I bought one and tried to dyed it and totally ruined it. Then I bought a second one and completely ruined that too. It looked pretty bad. I was running out of money so finally, I bought a warm, thick silk shawl, dyed that, and the colour came out perfect. Then I went to Prabhupāda’s room and gave him the shawl.
I explained, “Prabhupāda, I wanted to give this shawl to you because the one you have now has got blue paint on it. You are going to this big conference with all these professors and scholars, and I didn’t think you should go there with blue paint on your shawl.”
Now, I have to admit, there was a little calculation involved – I was hoping that if I gave this chaddar to Śrīla Prabhupāda, he would give me his spoilt chaddar, and I would have Prabhupāda’s prasādam! I had seen that generally, when someone would give something to Prabhupāda – like a new sweater, he would give them an old sweater back. So my expectations were very high.
Prabhupāda asked me where I bought the shawl, how much I paid for it, and we talked about the shawl for about fifteen minutes, then he said, “Thank you,” and I paid my obeisances and I left the room.
The next morning, I saw Prabhupāda and he was wearing two shawls – the new one and the old one with the blue paint on it…
I can honestly say that getting Prabhupāda’s old shawl wasn’t my main motive – I wanted to give something to Śrīla Prabhupāda, but it was in my mind that he might give me his old one and that didn’t happen. From this, I learned that I shouldn’t calculate what will be the result when I’m doing something. Sometimes you may give something to guru and he may give something in return; sometimes he may just say “thank you.” One day he may stop and talk to you, and another day, he may just walk right past you. We have to always be in the mood of submission. I should be happy if I get much attention or no attention. It should be unconditional.
Anyhow, the next day, I went on the bullock-cart program…
Mahāṁsa Dāsa: Everything was ready. The boys were ready, the bulls were ready, cart was ready. The next day itself, everyone got on to the cart and we had a big ceremony, a kīrtana and we gave a good farewell to the cart to go ahead at the Hyderabad farm. The goal was to reach Māyāpura during Gaura-pūrṇimā. That was the goal, some two and a half, three months was there. They started, and Jagat-guru Swami sat in the cart and it went.
