Sivaram Swami Re-writes History (Again)

JD: Then how are they Krishna's gurus? This insults Krishna. 

[PADA: It looks like Sivarama swami is struggling to explain his original position discussing the Bhakti Vidya Purna swami child molesting / abuse issue, where initially SRS was offering Bhagavad Gita 9:30 excuses to forgive a Vaishnava. OK but are child beaters and molesters Vaishnavas? 

And SRS was suggesting compensating BVP with financial support. Now he says his preaching these ideas was secret -- and was only meant for internal GBC discussions. What he really meant to say was something else entirely. Or, he was caught making the first round of arguments and now he has to re-write his own history to show -- he meant something else. Who is buying that? 

Sorry. The GBC knew about the overall purge of Srila Prabhupada devotees. They knew that some of their gurus were sexual predators and deviants early on. They knew the society was getting a bad public media name from a series of legal and police problems that all happened by 1980. 

And now it turns out -- they ALSO knew a lot about the molesting deviations going on in Mayapura and other places from recently exposed private documents circulating among the leaders like Badrinarayan, Gaura Govinda Maharaja ... even copies of these internal letters regarding Mayapur problems were sent to various gurukula student's parents. OK lots of them knew. 

Moreover, me and Sulochana's exposing the molesting issue was widely known by 1986 because he was assassinated for exposing this issue -- and this was in all the public medias in the Western world. Every ISKCON leader knew or should have. 

And in 1986 CBS TV did a show where Jane Wallace showed me footage from New Vrndavan where Kirtanananda was seated on a big throne, covered with the hands of many boys, and she asked me "is this pedophile heaven." And I said yes, it is. Everyone knew or should have because this was a regular public exhibition in front of thousands of devotees, and there are many photos.  

Now we are collectively in the process of collating written GBC documented statements, and statements from victims, parents and others, and it is looking like there has been a massive cover up of child abuse, or more to the point -- covering up child beating and rape.    

***** Dasi: Sivarama would make more sense, if these same overloaded manager people, like Sivarama swami, hadn't gone out of his way to contact someone out of the blue, after many years, to tell them to stop talking about the abuse his wife suffered as a child in ISKCON. He is not too busy for that? So, yeah, it does seem like a cover up of child abuse. 

  

PADA: Well yeah, and we were banned, beaten, chased with bats, and our friends were assassinated for reporting the child abuse. I would have been assassinated except the police intervened. That means the leaders have been very busy orchestrating resistance to exposing their molesting empire. A cover up. 

So I am not going to get into many of the weeds and details herein, but more are coming out every day, i.e. more victim's testimony and more incriminating internal GBC documents. The Sivarama letter is a little long winded so we will not make too much comment on it yet. Suffice it to say, many former victims are already commenting on it and they are enraged at his attempt to re-write history.

Meanwhile Mama Bear wrote to tell me this Mayapur Open Forum group is another de facto GBC managed cover up attempt. They are making a private forum to discuss the issue, and the issue is, how can we keep covering up for the regime and its star leaders like Kadamba Kanana swami and his GBC masters? They are doing everything they can to keep a lid on their child abuse issue, which is really a child beating and child raping organization, including making false flag reforms. Mama Bear predicts, its not going to work this time. The cat is quite literally not only out of the bag, its running too far away for the GBC to ever recover and catch it. 

Mama Bear: This is another false flag reform, it won't work ...

https://groups.google.com/g/mayapur-open-forum


S Dasa: 

Dear Swamis what is the use of your big knowledge, lectures and your so-called Bhakti when you all failed to protect the body, mind and soul of the ones that needed you the most.

The verse api cet su duracaro applies to persons like Bilvamangala Thakura and Ajamila who exercised their sexual desire with a prostitute and not on children.

EX BVPS it would better if you invited a prostitute and the entire world would be merciful upon your accidental fall-down. But what you did with help of your so-called swami friends is not api cet sudaracaro but it is raping of innocent children, women, and raping other people's faith.

There is a HUGE difference between accidental and a purposeful behavior. And that many Swamijis you have not understood, irrespective of your so called vast knowledge of Shastra and bhakti.

My request is to those whose hands are dirty in this directly or indirectly please step down from your positions and let other responsible persons lead Srila Prabhupada's movement.

As predicted by Srila Prabhupada demons have also disguised themselves in this movement but the history from the Shastra shows that Devas will always win with the help of Lord Vishnu.

May Srila Prabhupada empower his sincere disciples to lead this movement !!!

Hare Krishna 

D Dasi: Yes Bilvamangala Thakur and Ajamila were not sannyasis or spiritual masters. These were stories of fallen conditioned souls who became purified… Great Devotees. So-called spiritual masters in our movement who fall down… Is a lot more atrocious.

JY: Important to read only Srila Prabhupada's original books, not changed books that changes the purity, and the purity will be lost. They regularly change all the books, to keep moving the meaning towards Mayavadi, that is the goal for them. Little by little step by step and the gurus are not saying anything about it ... shows their loyalty! They know all this stuff and just cover-up, go-along-to-get-along. Most are blackmailed and can not even if they wanted to, tell the real story, because they would be off'ed.

TK: All leaders should be investigated. It's scary that they are all so quiet about all these scandals. This is so painful that this has affected so so many devotees and caused so much trouble, pain in their life and our leaders are so quiet. Usually they all love to talk so much about nothing, just some half hearted responses saying they didn't know about what was going on...it's disgusting really.

GG: That is why shastra says a person who is in an assembly and he pretends to not know has to be sent to hell.

FH: Who should make the investigation?

SD: ISKCON needs an external audit.

A Devi Dasi: Dear swamis and dear parents ... I'm a parent too, I m responsible too..

SD: Yep, we are all 100% responsible in our different roles. It takes a village to raise children, and it takes a society to protect them.

PW: Let the GBC make a clear resolution that sanyasi may not have any privately owned properties, real estate, private cars, private money and private secretaries. The money for their maintenance will be under strict control of the GBC and meticulously settled regularly. Moreover, it would be worth establishing a special independent court for serious abuses, i.e. pedophilia, abuse of guru competences and philosophical deviations. 

After so many events and in the perspective of ISKCON's development, it is simply a necessary prevention, otherwise, the leader is free to abuse in the name of so-called supremacy of authority Hare Krishna! All glories to Srila Prabhupada and His sincere followers! If GBC is not qualify to solve concrete problems then other old devotees of Srila Prabhupada should make new qualiified squad of GBC and make help from police or the Main Court.

PA Dasi: Thank you pr for coming forward. We need more devotees in this line of understanding . We need to shame them. The entire world is needed to shame them. Thus the empowerment of sincere devotees to lead ISKCON to take place.

LH: Many years ago Bhaktivaibhava Swami privately told his grihasta disciples that he would not give kids to gurukula... So he protected the abusers ...

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From: Sivarama swami

Dear Devotees,

Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada. A month ago I composed a letter to the GBC and ICPO with the purpose of pointing out ISKCON’s responsibility towards its members. That private letter was meant to raise questions for the GBC and ICPO to discuss, but unfortunately it was shared publicly and has been wrongfully interpreted as my official statement to the entire devotee community. 

I would like to clarify my words in their proper context, present my personal opinion on this issue, and apologise to the devotee community for any misconceptions that letter created.

While I took objection to a few comments in the CPO report, I would have never publicly called for the CPO directors to resign. They did not deserve to be humiliated in public and for that I apologise to them. Since its inception I have been a supporter of the work of the CPO and particularly appreciative of the service of the current directors.

[PADA: But the Sivarama program has $20,000,000 on hand to sue Bangalore, because Bangalore did not want to promote Bhakti Vidya Purna swami's Mayapura program, and little financial support for a CPO.]

In my letter I requested that the Mayapur management be held responsible for the abuses suffered by devotees under BVP — from now on to be referred to as Avd.

Furthermore, I petitioned the receivers to consider the role that scriptural statements like api cet suduracaro have in deciding cases of abuse and other crimes that come before the CPO, GBC, or Judicial Ministry, as well as what compensation is afforded primarily to victims and — secondarily and if appropriate—to culprits.

With the newly disclosed history of AVd’s latest child abuse and pastoral abuse, I mistakenly used him as the example to question whether the api cet principle was relevant to his crimes, and whether he would be eligible for compensation. I should not have done that.

Although these were principles and questions to be considered as typical of guidelines for compensation and their appropriateness — not proposals placed to the CPO and GBC—those questions have now been mistaken for my way of thinking and a proposal that AVd receive some stipend and a lighter sentence.

Nothing could be farther from the truth.

However, that is the interpretation making the rounds amongst devotee circles, and it is my haphazard communication that has become the cause of disturbance and anxiety for disciples, well-wishers, and Vaisnavas in general. As a sannyasa, ex-GBC, and guru my responsibility is to give spiritual leadership and not to confuse devotees into thinking that I protect a child abuser. I do not!

[PADA: Yep, that means our expose of these clowns is working.]

Allow me to make clear that I abhor and condemn, and always have, all forms of abuse, such as child abuse, domestic violence, and pastoral abuse— to name a few. As for AVd, I am disgusted at the revelation of his recent crimes and I believe he deserves more punishment than what the CPO has given him. I have no sympathy for him. He has had enough chances, and enough is enough.

In my letter, I wrote that I do not think he was a born abuser. That statement was wrong. I do not know how he was born, and whether abuse was part of his pre-ISKCON life. So logically I retract that sentence.

Below I will make clear my real attitude to AVd.

Firstly it is important for me to state that this was a private letter written to confidential conferences and closely concerned devotees. I had no intention of communicating to the devotee world. Unfortunately, the letter was leaked and here we are.

In any case, considering to whom I was writing, I did not take the time to either carefully consider or edit the letter. In my almost 40 years on the GBC, that would be the way we sometimes presented ideas, which members would then critique. No doubt had I received feedback from members they would be saying something like, Member 1: Sivarama Swami you have some good points, but some of your stuff is really misleading. Member 2: It sounds like you are a supporter of AVd, that you want to lessen his sentence and give him a pension or something. Member 3: You better rewrite this thing to say what you actually mean, or just forget the whole thing.

And so I would apologise to them for my muddle and then clarify my words. I write this to make clear that such was the audience to whom I was writing, and naturally I would have realised my mistakes—as I do now—and make adjustments accordingly. In conclusion, I had no intention or need to write my message to a wider, what to speak of global, devotee audience. However, I understand that as my letter has been circulated, it can appear as if I am considering AVd and child abusers saintly merely because they have been in ISKCON for some time.

That is not the case and I regret the confusion my letter caused.

I want to emphasise that aside from a proposal regarding the CPO, throughout my letter I either ask the GBC questions or request them to consider certain topics, including topics on AVd or the api cet suduracaro principle. In that text I am not presenting my personal opinion, but asking the ultimate managing body of the Society to consider them and make decisions as they see fit. 

Following that, my primary conclusion is that Mayapur, like any yatra in ISKCON where such abuse would take place, bears the moral, spiritual, and financial responsibility for transgressions taking place on its campus. Next point.

In the introductory background to the letter, I also explain that AVd has been an acquaintance and not a “bosom buddy.” That is certainly the truth: a few photos depicting friendly poses during festivals at which he was a guest do not negate that truth. Aside from his visits to Hungary, I had no interaction with him via email or phone, and on my stays in Mayapur over the years he never visited me, nor I him. 

Indeed, even at the times when I am in Mayapur, we maintain zero contact via internet or phone. The exception was the two times that I stayed in a hut on gurukula campus in the early ’90s. But even then we shared minimal interaction, since I was always in GBC meetings from morning till night. I emphasise that my letter was not meant to defend a close friend. I offer no defence for his abuses, neither do I think he requires maintenance from ISKCON. On this point of a stipend, I will say the following: If Mayapur offers any laksmi at all by way of compensation, and that is a big “if,” then there is a long line of abused devotees to whom it will be offered first. 

That I make clear in my letter. I do not believe for a minute that there would be any stipend for their abuser. One of the many reasons AVd obviously disqualifies himself to deserve support is that at no time in the past year has he sent a letter of apology for his misdeeds to his many abused victims. Neither has he sent apology to Mayapur community devotees, to devotees in general, or to myself and the devotees of Hungary, where his fiasco has disturbed both the faith of many in Srila Prabhupada’s movement and their path back to Godhead.

Devotees have asked what my knowledge was of AVd’s atrocities over the years. My answer to that question is, “As much as any GBC.” 

My first knowledge of AVd’s behaviour was in the 1991 investigation, after which he was restricted in a variety of ways, one being to not stay in Mayapur all the time, but to travel. In 2000, the newly formed CPO did a deeper review of the pre-1991 gurukula abuses and gave him further restrictions, such as no further initiations. No doubt these restrictions were insufficient. 

After 2000, the only mention of AVd was the 2015 CPO report on the girl’s gurukula, wherein the sannyasa ministry was requested to look into allegations against him. For reasons beyond my knowledge, no report ensued. In short, between 1991 and 2000 AVd was not charged with any new abuse. And from 2000–2021, there has been no official investigation or report on him. 

Did I hear of any abuse of that time? While no one came to me in person to make a report, through the grapevine I heard a few allegations. However, since no official body took action, I assumed the allegations were inaccurate. To this day, I do not know why further investigations didn’t happen. That is what I knew. The next question devotees quite rightly raise is, “Why did you let a known abuser come to Hungary?” As he had been requested to travel outside India, in 1992 or ’93 he was brought to the Hungarian yatra to help cook for our big travelling festival. 

He was liked by devotees for his knowledge of deity worship, culture, and his interesting classes. So he was invited back on multiple occasions, until 2018. In that time, he initiated six disciples and gathered a following amongst devotees, but he was never allowed to deal with children in any way. Since we were following his CPO restrictions, and since there were no new charges against him between 1991 and 2021, I mistakenly presumed that he had reformed his ways, and so I thought it fair to give him a chance. 

Srila Prabhupada asked us to reform and not remove devotees who have erred. For example, we currently have successful GBC’s who had left ISKCON but were given a chance to return. Similarly, I had experience of a fallen sannyasas who, when given a chance, successfully reformed. Of course, violence and Vaisnava aparadha is a different category; nevertheless, I naively thought he was a changed person. 

I now deeply regret my naivety. Additionally, because AVd and I were not close, he never confided his problems to me. It may be asked why AVd’s truly brutal and sadistic beatings of children were not enough for me and others to shut the doors on him. Three decades ago, I, like the majority of ISKCON’s leadership, was much less educated on child abuse than I am now. 

So the 2000 report didn’t ring the same alarm bells as they would now. I don’t give this answer as any form of justification, but rather as an explanation of facts. As I mentioned, AVd had a clean record since 1991, other yatras gave him a chance, and in all his time in Hungary there was never a complaint against him. He behaved well. That warranted a chance to prove himself. 

In conclusion, allow me to add a few points why I and the GBC overlooked a sadist who was living in our midst in the guise of a sannyasa and guru. The GBC are devotees who, like everyone else in our Society, joined ISKCON to chant and be happy. In Srila Prabhupada’s service they accepted the duties of the GBC whether they were qualified managers or not. 

Added to that was the duty of guru for most, and temple president for some, which meant they carried the workload of two or three people, generally with insufficient backup. Thus child protection, to which ISKCON only opened its eyes in the 1990s, while top priority, was still only one of dozens of pressing issues and of even more other duties. 

In short, GBC men were overloaded. And overloaded managers easily overlook things. However, more significant is the difference between day-to-day knowledge and historical hindsight. Today devotees look at the last 30 years of AVd’s acts as a clear picture, and so they may wonder, “Why didn’t the GBC know what was going on?” 

Some even think that there is a massive “cover-up” of child abuse in ISKCON. However, when AVd’s abuse—known and unknown—is incremental over 30 years, the picture is only gradually filled in and only gains clarity with the benefit of hindsight. This is the case with all sorts of crimes committed globally, which are difficult to detect and only become known with the passing of years. 

In hindsight it may be easy to say that AVd’s abuses were obvious, but when seen day by day over the course of decades they were not. What to speak of I or others having the foresight in 1991 to see how twisted a person he was.

Thus when devotees ask why I did not see AVd for what he was, and why I did not distance myself and my yatra from him, I can only say that at the time the picture was not clear to me, whereas now it is evident. I accept that this is a case of misjudgement and mismanagement on my part, and it also speaks to the lengths of deceit an abuser will go to in order to hide his crimes.

In my almost 40 years as GBC, while trying my best to serve Srila Prabhupäda, I have made mistakes. Of course, I wish I had not given AVd the benefit of doubt, and I wish I had not written my recent letter. Both are regretted. In this letter I have tried to give more detailed reasoning of what I meant by my letter of November, and why I acted as I did with AVd over the last 30 years. 

The last thing I wanted was to create a disturbance in devotees’ minds and in Srila Prabhupada’s movement. For that I humbly apologise to the devotee community and request their forgiveness. And I especially apologise to AVd’s many victims for the pain I must have inflicted upon them. Abuse of any kind is never acceptable and we, as a Society, must collectively do better. 

This incident should not have happened, and we all share responsibility; the whole system failed the victims. This is a much-needed wake-up call for all leaders and yatras to take child protection more seriously, and to take added precautions in the future. In fact, I urge the GBC and leaders of ISKCON to make our Society one in which both adults and children benefit from complete protection and care. 

Personally I shall continue to make myself available to victims of abuse and help them any way that I can. I am aware that some devotees will critique and reject my presentation, while others may find it therapeutic. All I can say is that I have tried to act for others’ best interest and herein I have told the truth. This recent chaos was the last thing I wanted, for my entire life has always been dedicated to the service of Vaisnavas.

May Srila Prabhupada and the Vaisnava forgive me.

Your servant,

Sivarama Swami

7 December 2022

Mayapur.

[PADA: First of all, we said that Jayatirtha is a de facto pedophile for having sex with his spiritual dependent in 1979. He was also offering LSD to the shalgram and etc. And we were booted out of the society. 

Then in 1980 we began to complain about Bhavananda, and Mayapur, and many other things. We were ignored. We made all sorts of newsletters in the 1980s sometimes, or often, mentioning child abuse. Then Sulochana joined me and we conjointly addressed child abuse and molesting around 1985. And he was killed and I would have been killed except the FBI was tapping their phones, so the cops intercepted their hit men in 1986.

A gurukuli also told me extensively how he was having problems in Mayapur in 1984, and when he reported that to the local authority, they told him to shut up. And the list here is really endless, for example we started mentioning the suicides in our news in the mid-1990s, which lead to the 1998 Windle Turley development. How this factory industrial level of abuse was not known by the leaders is hard to imagine. I am just not buying it, and neither are many others.

PR: Its what he didn't do for the previous 39 years that he's angry about, including as these letters state -- encouraging this mother to send her child and his brothers to the gurukula where they were abused, even though SRS was fully aware that the Maharaj was an abuser. I'd be furious too if it was me.

And then there's the fact that nothing was done by either JPS or the management of Mayapur or the GBC to remove this Hiranyakashipu who was brutally torturing and letting these kids be raped. What exactly do you have to do to get removed in Iskcon? Become a Ritvik? Oh yea he would have been removed within 24 hours had he become a Ritvik or God forbid join another Sanga ... but molest and torture kids? That takes 40 years.

SRD: Not for public consumption'... There is what I am -- and there is what want you to think that I am... So he was naive with AV for 30 years, but now he's realized his mistakes... He apologies, and to make up for it, therefore -- he's decided to harbor on his farm the two people who enabled the abuse!

OK...

PADA: Very busy managing? OK. The GBC was very busy dealing with some very pressing issues starting in 1997. First of all, they had to figure out to declare the entire ISKCON bankrupted so they could avoid paying the abuse victims, and that was exhausting labor being on the phones with lawyers all day long, and raising millions of dollars to pay these lawyers. Then, they were very busy forming a gaggle of orange robed people in front of Watseka to make their scowling mob as I rode by on my bike. 

They could not really only talk to lawyers, they also had to heavy up us, and give us vulture glare vibes because we were helping the victims. Then, around the same time they decided to sue Bangalore, because they would not agree to sign up and make Bangalore a sub-division of the Bhakti Vidya Purna swami fan club in Mayapur. 

And so Jayapataka was raising the roof shouting all the time how they needed only a spare $20,000,000 to sue Bangalore. And they were very angry I was making a newsletter about the molesting and other crimes going on. I would say they were in fact very busy. The only question now is, did they join ISKCON to chant Hare Krishna and be happy, or to figure out all these devious schemes and plots? And how can they say they did not know anything, when we were collating testimony from victims and they knew that, but they never once asked me anything about it? They were too busy doing too many tasks, well yes, but are these the tasks they were supposed to be doing to help ISKCON and its citizens? 

ys pd

PADA @ angel108b@yahoo.com