New Mayapur and Malibu Compared

Hrdyayananda in Malibu

 

Burnt Laddu Dasa: Mr. PADA, Here is my question. Why are the big leaders living in expensive places like Carpenteria, Venice Beach, Malibu etc. ... the most expensive real estate anywhere ... while there are all sorts of ISKCON zones and temples going bankrupt. Or even whole ISKCON has been going bankrupted in North America. And there are so many poor devotees like Visvareta ... who seems like he cannot even afford a cell phone. 

And why would the SAME people who caused the ISKCON society to go bankrupt ... and who helped create $400,000,000 child molesting lawsuits etc. ... then be rewarded with fancy houses, servants, being worshiped as gurus etc. 

It seems like the more terrible a person is at managing ISKCON ... and the more a person's bogus program is responsible for molesting and many other crimes ... the higher he goes on the totem pole of glorious ISKCON worship. Why would a society increase the worship of the same people ... who destroyed that society and its children? I am baffled! And so are a lot of my friends!

[PADA: Yup. That is the question.] angel108b@yahoo.com

[UPDATE] NEW MAYAPUR

Down payments covered thanks to you!

FULL RENOVATIONS STILL NEED TO BE COVERED

PLEASE HELP US PREVENT A CLOSURE LATER THIS YEAR

Hare Krishna! By Krishna's inconcievable mercy, a most generous disciple of HH Indradyumna Swami has pledged 100,000 euros! This is a miracle and we cannot thank them enough. We want to extend our heartfelt gratitude to all those who donated and showed their care. Your selfless service will be eternally etched in our hearts and those of Sri Sri Gaura Nitai, Sri Sri Krishna Balaram, Sri Sri Radha Govinda-Madhava and Srila Prabhupada.

This amount should cover the down payments when signing all the quotes to show to the government officials and to begin work. So the worst danger seems averted for now. The temple should not be closed down on 6th June!

Still, in the coming months we will need to pay the professionals the full amount to finish the work before the next government check up. Thus, everyone’s contribution, however big or small, continues to be extremely vital for New Mayapur to not face a closure later this year.

We will be providing detailed breakdowns of individual costs and updates on the work that will take place as soon as we finalize all the negotiations.
So far we received the following quotes:

- 160 000€ for castle electricity
- 91 000€ for castle centralized alarm

We will study them and get more for comparison.

As of now, we are still missing quotes for fire doors, architect plans, further administrative costs and guesthouse related repairs. Once we receive all the necessary information, we will update the GoFundMe target accordingly.
Once again, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts, and we hope we can get the opportunity to serve you and welcome you to New Mayapur soon!
We offer our heartfelt obeisances to you.

All glories to Srila Prabhupada! All glories to all the kindhearted souls who are saving New Mayapur!

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Q: How has the Hrdayananda program treated the children of ISKCON?

A: Books by Hare Krishna Historian Henry Doktorski

May 1996: On or around this date in history 26 years ago, at the North American GBC meeting in Alachua, Florida, a panel of ten former gurukula students invited to speak by the leadership, detailed case after case of “heart-wrenching suffering at the hands of school authorities which reduced the entire audience of educators to tears.” ISKCON Communications Journal reported:

An increased impetus for change came in May 1996, at the North American GBC meeting in Alachua, Florida. Here a group of former gurukula pupils, invited to speak by the leadership, detailed case after case of heart-wrenching suffering at the hands of school authorities which reduced the entire audience of educators to tears.

Virtually every former student (these included those who had attended schools over the last twenty years) at the conference was either a witness or a victim. Children suffered denial of medical care for life-threatening illnesses, serious bruises and contusions, lost teeth, broken noses, scarring from caning, repeated sexual abuse and even homosexual rape at knife point. 

The perpetrators of these very serious crimes were none other than the teachers, the ashram leaders, the administrators, and in some cases even sannyasis and ISKCON gurus. . . .

An entire generation of children had been subjected to horrendous treatment at the hands of those entrusted with their welfare by parents who thought that they were doing what was best for their children. The children, now adults, had complained before and no one had listened.

“I remember being made to sleep naked in a cold bathtub for a month,” said Jahnavi dasi, age 26, in an interview. She had been sent to the Los Angeles school at age four. “I had wet my bed, and it was easier for them to make me sleep in the tub than to change my sheets.”

Jahnavi also told the ISKCON elders that when she had some serious health issues, her teachers dismissed her complaints, saying they were simply a ruse to avoid cleaning duties and chanting in the temple. She was denied medical care and eventually lost consciousness. She was in a coma for three weeks. Only after falling unconscious was she taken to a hospital. She related, “They neglected to take me to a doctor, so I ended up in a coma.”

Anuttama dasa (Geoffrey Walker) the North American ISKCON Director of Communications, promised, “We need to get to the bottom of it, and to the best of our ability do whatever we can to try to repair the damage to the kids and show them we do care as a religious society.”

Gold, Guns and God, Vol. 4, pp. 421-422