11 Naked Emperors "Crushing the Opposition"

Pradyumna das

From the book "11 Naked Emperors"

August 7, 1978: On this date in history 42 years ago, Pradyumna dasa (Paul H. Sherbow)—a senior ISKCON scholar “brilliant in Sanskrit learning” who edited the Sanskrit and Bengali passages in Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada’s books and at one time served as Prabhupada’s personal secretary—expressed his grave concerns about the zonal acharya debacle in a widely-publicized August 1978 letter to Satsvarupa. “At the time of Shrila Prabhupada’s disappearance, it was most clearly understood by all of us present that Shrila Prabhupada made no successor. Everyone admitted that fact and understood it clearly. . . . These are not good signs for our society. Older godbrothers and sannyasis here are very concerned that if the present trend is not checked immediately, it will have passed beyond that point and ISKCON will be in chaos in the near future.”

Pradyumna’s letter to Satsvarupa was ignored by the GBC. In fact, as punishment, Pradyumna’s service of completing the translation of Shrimad-bhagavatam was taken from him and given to Hrdayananda Maharaja. Within a year, Pradyumna left or was forced out of ISKCON.

“There were severe consequences for any Prabhupada disciple who disrespected the zonal guru system,” Nandini devi dasi, an Assistant Editor for ISKCON World Review, confirmed. “A scholarly devotee in India [Pradyumna dasa] had written to one of the gurus [Satsvarupa dasa Goswami] to express philosophical points that made him doubt the validity of the system, and then he was silenced and forced out of the organization. 

His assignment of translating the remaining volumes of Shrimad-bhagavatam passed to one of the [new] gurus [Hrdayananda Goswami]. They made an example of him [Pradyumna], and the incident chilled the atmosphere for anyone else who wanted to speak out.”

At the March 1999 GBC meetings, an apology was offered to Pradyumna, who twenty-one years earlier had tried to warn his godbrothers and sisters about the inherent instability of the zonal-acharya system and who had been subsequently shunned by the society.

“Eleven Naked Emperors,” Chapter 8, “Crushing the Opposition,” p. 144

[PADA: A few devotees have wrote to PADA to complain that Bhakti Raghava Swami, Bhakti Vikas Swami, Bhakti Tirtha swami, Gaura Govinda Maharaja, Mukunda Maharaja and others have been sincere souls and we should not have criticized them. OK, but they were all participants, cheer leaders, enablers, if not vociferous defenders of the GBC's illicit sex acharya's program. 

Sulochana called these people "the velvet glove covering the iron fist. Looks soft and loving, and then 'bam,' you are dead." 

Recently one outside "book and article writer" interviewed PADA editor and he asked me about Mukunda Maharaja. I said he was one of the biggest writers for the GBC's guru program post-1978 with his "ISKCON World Review." And the writer said to me -- he had seen some videos of Mukunda, and Mukunda was "the slickest salesperson ever." He said, "if I ever was arrested and had to hire someone to defend me, I'd hire Mukunda. That guy could sell ice cubes to the Eskimos." Hee hee! Even ordinary folks can figure this all out. 

Of course there are even so-called ritviks who wanted to have PADA "removed from the internet." Yep, crush the opposition. Its why we have had this imbroglio the whole time, too many people have been on the wrong side of the issue. That is turning around gradually, because the defects of the wrong side are just too self evident and so its getting harder to defend.

ys pd]