46- Mayapur Attempt To Storm Calcutta Temple
From: Adri@cwcom.net (Adridharana) Date: 30.Apr.2001

Contents:

1. Mayapur Attempt To Storm Calcutta Temple Ends in Fiasco
 
"He Who Clenches Fist Has Already Lost The Argument"
(Chinese Proverb)

We have reported previously in this newsletter about how the Guru cartel that runs the GBC has turned the current ISKCON movement into a crazy cult which will use any amount of violence to acquire power; that nothing has changed from the mad zonal acarya days, where intimidation, beating and violence against devotees was routine. However we have also reported that though those tactics may have worked in the past, now that the IRM has been formed as an organised and disciplined force to stand up to the GBC, they just do not work anymore. One will note that the GBC were defeated philosophically a long time ago, with 'The Final Order' paper still standing unanswered and undefeated. We have also reported how the GBC are suffering defeat in the courts as well. So like so many dishonest movements over the years, having being defeated on every rational and civilised level, and having no other means by which to enforce their desire for  power, they can only resort to violence. But as we will now graphically demonstrate, even their use of violence is defeated, for truth will always overcome all forces - "Satyam Vijayate" - Truth is victorious.

The High drama began on Friday afternoon as 100 'devotees' from Mayapur burst into the Calcutta temple. The so-called 'devotees' also contained many professional 'heavies' who had been hired especially for the event. They immediately demanded to take possession of the temple, and began to occupy the ashram and other parts of the building. Devotees from the temple who got in their way were beaten and sustained injuries. Coordinating all this from the outside was Dayarama Das, the Chief Executive of Mayapur. When I came down from my office to confront them a huge crowd of them also rushed to attack me, but I and 2 other devotees managed to fight them off. Leading this supposedly 'vaisnava' behaviour was Bhakti Purosottama Swami, a leading Jayapataka Swami Sannyasa. The Police arrived however and most of the Mayapur gang were removed, with some of them, including Bhakti Purosottama Swami, put in jail. But around 25 of them had sneaked into the temple room and began performing kirtan to evade arrest - claiming that they had simply come to take darshan. To prevent further trouble the temple was then locked with these 25 agents from Mayapur already inside. The Police had said that it was best to let them stay until the situation had cooled down, and the day was over, and then they would be removed.
 
By late evening, with most of the intruders removed, the trouble seemed to have passed, and all those who had been locked up in jail were subsequently released. However the night was just beginning.

The Mayapur gang quickly swung into the next part of their plan. Led by Dayarama Das, those who had just been released from jail, along with dozens of other 'hired hands', as well as well two bus-loads of devotees from Mayapur, began to congregate outside the temple. The crowd eventually rose to over 300, all demonstrating and demanding entry into the temple. The local police soon became overwhelmed and any attempt to remove the 25 Mayapur agents still inside was now out of the question, as they were barely managing to keep the crowd at bay. Consequently another about 25 Mayapur 'devotees' from this huge crowd managed to climb the walls at the back of the temple and gain entry. They joined up with the 25 Mayapur agents who were already inside. As we were to later discover, all 50 of them were all heavily armed with knives, machetes, chains, nails and hammers. They had also brought 8 changes of locks with them. Clearly this was a carefully planned operation to forcibly occupy the temple through violence. As usual coordinating all this from outside was Dayarama das, who was at the head of the 300 strong crowd, and who was shouting instructions both verbally as well as via his cell phone. He had also organised about 50 hired professional thugs armed with metal bars, who were dressed in security uniforms and were standing outside waiting to charge in.

Heavily armed to the teeth, and outnumbering our devotees 3:1 (as all our householder devotees live outside), these 50 agents of the Mayapur gang quickly ran amok and took over the whole temple. All the temple devotees were threatened with severe violence if they tried to intervene. The night wore on and we were now well into the early hours of Saturday morning. The local police who were trying their best to keep the huge crowd at bay, were powerless to do anything, as those inside forcibly took possession. At this point Dayarama phoned Gopal Krishna Swami, the GBC for India, and informed him that the temple was now 'taken', and the ritviks were ousted. Gopal immediately relayed the 'good' news to other GBC's, Gurus and members of the ISKCON Bureau (which is controlled by the Gurus). Very quickly the news is all over Mayapur and the higher echelons of ISKCON, that 'Calcutta is now in GBC hands'.

As usual, the jubilation, was to prove severely premature, for we had already made full preparations to deal with this 'invasion'.

The 50 Mayapur agents inside waited for re-reinforcements from the huge crowd outside, which they expected was now only minutes away, so that the temple could 'officially' be taken over, with myself and the other temple devotees ejected. However these 'reinforcements' never came, for at around 1a.m., extra police from outside the area came and cleared most of the crowd. As the morning approached, the 50 strong Mayapur gang became more and more frustrated. For though they were inside alright, they were unable to get out, no one else was able to get in, and the temple was still not completely in their hands! Who was really trapped here!

They thus began to act more and more out of desperation. They threatened the devotees, ripped out phone lines, and began to perform random acts of vandalism, damaging temple furniture. But they still had not mustered up enough courage to come and confront me in my office. Myself and the devotees simply remained calm, for very soon, the mischief was going to be at an end, and every action they took now was simply sealing their fate. At 10.30 am, two huge police trucks with over a hundred Calcutta policeman pulled up with 3 large empty police vans in tow. Then, they swung into action with a style that could have come straight out of a Hollywood action movie. In seconds they swarmed over the whole temple shouting - "Get the Mayapur goondas." ('Goonda" means criminal in Hindi). Forming snatch squads they immediately seized and beat the 50 Mayapura goondas who were inside. These 'brave' fighters immediately began to flee, dropping their weapons, and hiding under the beds and cupboards of the ashram. Some of the Mayapur thugs tried to hide in the Temple room, and they locked themselves in, and would not let the Police enter. The Police easily managed to force the door. Some were even caught changing out of their dhotis into regular clothes so they could pretend they were simply 'guests'! The police ruthlessly rounded them up and bundled them into the Police vans, beating them with sticks as they resisted. They searched every nook and cranny of the temple to make sure not a trace of them was left. The whole operation was over in 10 minutes. What had taken Mayapura weeks to plan, lakhs of rupees to finance, and a whole night to put into action, was now over in minutes. The Police then came to my office and asked me to take them on a tour of the temple to see if there were still any of the intruders left that I wanted arrested. We then found a further four of them hiding up on the roof! They were also bundled up and thrown in the waiting police vans to join their buddies. For good measure the Police also arrested over 20 members from the crowd outside the temple, who had been cheering thesthugs inside on all night. And while these arrests were being made, Dayarama was seen running for his life, as he left his hapless supporters at the mercy of the police.  He went and took shelter at his Father-in-law's house nearby! And to ensure that such thuggery is never allowed to happen again, there are now over 30 policeman posted on 24 hour guard at the temple.
 
It is also clear that this was at the very least, a joint Dayarama, Gopal Krishna, Jayapataka Swami and Bhakti Caru Swami operation. We have already reported on Dayarama's role as commander on the scene and his communication with Gopal Krishna.

Further virtually all of the aggressors in addition to the hired hands, were dozens of leading disciples of Jayapataka Swami and Bhakti Caru Swami, who could never have acted in such a calculated and violent manner without having had the green light from their 'Gurus'.

The net result of this fiasco was that in total almost 80 members of the Mayapur gang were arrested and spent time in jail, with over 70 of them having to spend the whole night, and who are now bailed to appear before the court again to face formal charges. And as we will now document, the GBC-Guru gang also exposed themselves to the whole world as the shameless violent thugs they are, who have nothing except sheer raw violence left at their disposal. For they abandoned the truth, reason, and normal civilised codes of conduct long ago, with any hope of vaisnava behaviour not even on the horizon. And the IRM are still in charge of the temple, and have emerged even stronger from this ordeal as the public, police and press have rallied to their support.

For those who are still undecided as to whether they should continue to follow the GBC-Gurus or Srila Prabhupada as represented by the IRM, we hope this naked display of thuggery and violence will have made the decision they need to take crystal clear! If any more proof is required that we are dealing not with a spiritual organisation composed of 'devotees', but a violent crazy cult now facing meltdown, one only needs to consider one simple fact:

They actually thought that a violent mob could come and take over a temple and nothing would happen!

It is said that one of the symptoms of a crazy cult is that they are unable to relate to the real world, and they imagine the whole world is simply an extension of the crazy world  they inhabit. Maybe such violent tactics work inside Mayapura and other Guru run ISKCON temples, but they sure do not work anywhere else! As we have said many times before, the creation of the IRM signals the end of the days when devotees would just roll over and give in to the Gurus. We will fight them to the very end, and we will win. For just as in the battle of Kuruksetra, though the Kauravas had all of Krishna's armies at their disposal, the Pandavas won because they had truth, righteousness and Krishna on their side. Similarly Mayapura came with a huge army of over 400 and weapons. 'Little' Calcutta had nothing except the fact that they represented the truth, and were willing to stand up for it. And as always, truth won over the forces of darkness as represented by violence and thuggery used by Mayapura to try and keep Srila Prabhupada kicked out of his rightful place as the Guru of ISKCON.

 

 

2. Mayapur's Thuggery Brings Shame To ISKCON All Over India
 
Unfortunately this display of violence and thuggery by Mayapura has brought shame and disrepute to ISKCON all over India, for the press were not slow in broadcasting this news. Every TV station in West Bengal, as well as others with national reach, broadcast this story repeatedly on their headline news bulletins. The tens of millions of viewers were shocked as they were shown a graphic display of the weapons the thugs had brought, including the knives, chains and machetes. And these are supposed to be 'monks'! For a movement that has already sunk to an all time low in the public consciousness, this attack was nothing but an act of suicide in terms of public relations. It seems that the GBC-Gurus are determined to destroy any shred of public credibility the movement has left. To give you a flavour of the press coverage, we reproduce below excerpts from some of the items that appeared in the main national and regional Sunday newspapers:


Asian Age

"72 ISKCON Men Held For Rowdyism"

Seventy two ISKCON Mayapur devotees were arrested by the Shakespeare Sarani Police on charges of rowdyism on Saturday morning. They have been kept in Police custody. Sources say that more than 250 ISKCON Mayapur devotees barged into the ISKCON Revival Movement office on Albert Road on Friday evening and tried to assault IRM President Adridharana Das who, they claimed, is no more the president. Adridharana Das had filed a case against 70 ISKCON Mayapur Gurus who claimed they were the chief leaders of the ISKCON Movement. Das said ISKCON only had one leader - Srila Prabhupada. This has been the major bone of contention between the two factions. They assaulted the 15 IRM devotees who lived inside the temple and held them hostage for the entire night. They again assaulted the IRM devotees on Saturday night.

"They were always looking for a chance to attack me. They planned the assault and did it on Friday because the court is closed on Saturday and Sunday and I cannot appeal there", Das said.

The Telegraph

"Devotees Arrested in Temple Tussle."

The factional feud at Iskcon took a decisive turn on Saturday morning with the arrest of 72 devotees. A dozen policemen from the Shakespeare Sarani thana rounded up the devotees, who had been camping both outside and inside the Albert Road temple since Friday, on charges of "unlawful assembly, rioting and assault".
On Friday afternoon, the dispute had come to a head, with over 80 devotees trying to unseat city Iskcon president Adridharana Das, who has been "suspended" by the Iskcon Bureau, the Mumbai-based administrative body of the Society. After clashes broke out, the police had arrested seven devotees who were later released on bail. [...]

"Around 10.30 am, when we saw the crowd was still there, we decided to enter the temple, fearing bloodshed might occur at any moment," said Prosanta Banerjee, additional commissioner (II), south division. Adridharana said: "The police scaled the walls, and went to every corner of the building, pulling out everyone." Banerjee was one of the four officers injured in the ensuing tussle.

But Dayaram and the handful of those who have not been arrested are crying foul over the police action. "When devotees were engaged in kirtan within the temple, a posse of policemen suddenly entered and dragged them out and arrested them," according to Dayaram. "It is our temple... We cannot be refused admission. Adri has been suspended, but he refuses to accept the decision taken by our Bureau," he said. His fellow disciples are being held at the Lalbazar lockup and are due to be produced in court on Sunday. "They have arrested everyone, except for the one man who no longer has a right to be inside the premises: Adridharana Das," Dayaram said.

The Times Of India

"ISKCON Devotees, Monks Arrested"

The city Police on Saturday arrested 72 devotees and monks of the International Society For Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) who went on a rampage and clashed inside its Kolkata Temple office. Assistant Commissioner of Police (South Division) Prasanta Chatopadhyay, and four constables were injured while trying to separate the warring sadhus. [...]
On Saturday, devotees and monks were arrested from the temple office on the charge of unlawful assembly, police said. About 150 devotees and monks of ISKCON's Mayapur temple arrived here last  (Friday) night, and tried to "evict the outsiders" in the ISKCON's Albert Road temple office. This led to heated scuffles and exchanges, police said.

Though the nature of the "dispute" was not known, police said tension had been brewing on the premises since Friday night. The arrested were lodged in the city police lock-up. A police contingent has been posted
in front of the ISKCON temple office.

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Thus the public are now fully aware of the violent methods the so-called 'monks' of the GBC-Guru camp are ready to resort to in their campaign to hold onto their positions of power after having sat in Srila Prabhupada's seat. Indeed at the bail hearing in court this morning, the Judge was laughing at all these so-called 'sadhus' who were now facing charges!

 

Unfortunately, as would be expected from the members of a crazy cult, the GBC and their supporters are not all shocked or upset after having heard about this shocking violent take-over attempt. They are only upset, that once again, the GBC forces did not succeed, and indeed were humiliated by the IRM. Indeed the leaders in Mayapur have already announced that next time they will come with 'tens of thousands'! It is this attitude which is ensuring that the GBC-Guru group is alienating itself from the public, the life members, the courts and the Police. And it is this attitude which, as we have reported in our newsletters, is sowing the seeds for the GBC-Guru faction's eventual downfall, as the IRM intensifies its campaign to restore Srila Prabhupada as the sole Guru for ISKCON. For as we have pointed out so many times - it is not the numbers that matter, but truth that counts - and no matter how many thugs they may bring, they will never succeed in defeating those who are standing up for Srila Prabhupada.

 

3. Fiasco Allows Unprecedented Preaching Opportunity

As well as severely damaging the reputation of ISKCON in India, and creating a public relations disaster for the GBC-Guru faction, this latest bout of GBC thuggery has however handed an unprecedented preaching opportunity for the IRM. For every TV station in West Bengal, as well as other national and international TV companies, interviewed me on Saturday about the nature of the dispute, and subsequently beamed my interview unedited into every home in West Bengal and beyond. And this interview was aired repeatedly on all the news bulletins every hour on Saturday night. However NO spokesmen from the GBC-Guru faction were interviewed!

This preaching opportunity would normally have cost us tens of thousands of dollars in advertising costs, but thanks to the GBC's violent tendency, we were handed it on a plate for free! The TV stations which interviewed me in the Calcutta temple office on Saturday following the attack and arrests, were a mixture of local, national and international TV companies and programmes and included:
 
Khas Khaber; Taja Khaber; (The most popular Bengali news programmes in the whole of West Bengal);
HNBC; CYGNUS; ETV

Each aired my interview in its entirety, parts of which are given below:

"I am the Chairman of the ISKCON Revival Movement, IRM, and the Calcutta temple is this movement's headquarters. The IRM is a group of devotees within ISKCON who have organised themselves to restore Srila Prabhupada as the only Guru for ISKCON. Srila Prabhupada had sent out a directive to the whole movement on July 9th, 1977 which was to be enshrined as a policy for the whole movement. In this directive he established him as the only Guru for the movement by appointing 11 of his disciples to acting as purohits (priests) to make disciples on his behalf by performing initiation ceremonies. The minute Srila Prabhupada departed, these 11 purohits converted themselves into Gurus, replacing Srila Prabhupada as the Guru for the movement. Subsequently these 11 Gurus expanded themselves into 7 dozen Gurus, and thus the movement today has 7 dozen problems.The IRM has filed a case against all these substitute Gurus in the Calcutta high court. As the IRM makes progress, the 7 dozen Gurus become disenfranchised, and in frustration retaliate by sending their disciples to attack the HQ of the IRM. THIS is the real issue."

They also filmed a picture of Srila Prabhupada for over 10 seconds, announcing in the voice-over, that this was the REAL Guru of ISKCON!

I also distributed "The Final Order" book to all TV reporters, and told them to study it carefully if they wanted to understand what the dispute was about.

The attack has also helped the IRM in that it has shocked the public to such an extent that it has created great sympathy for the IRM from the public, and galvanised them into rallying around the IRM in support. The temple was besieged with calls from ordinary members of the public offering messages of support and sympathy. Many members actually came in person and said that "we are with you", and that they will assemble thousands of people to protect the temple next time.

 

Conclusion 

As this newsletter has documented, every move the GBC-Guru faction makes against the IRM ends up being a huge disaster. This latest violent escapade of the GBC-Guru faction failed spectacularly in its attempt of trying to take over the temple, and only ended up achieving the following:

1) Over 70 of their number were arrested and spent the night in jail and are due to appear in court to face formal charges;
2) Exposed the GBC-Guru faction publicly as being the violent criminals they are;
3) Severely damaged the reputation of ISKCON in the public eye;
4) Gave the IRM a great opportunity to preach to millions of people and to strengthen its position.

It has also been a severe loss in face and prestige for Mayapura, having announced to the world that they had taken Calcutta, and having never had their use of mob violence, which they have used successfully over the years against local villagers and devotees, so completely defeated before.

That the GBC-Guru faction felt it necessary to take a such a desperate and drastic move of trying to violently storm the IRM HQ with hundreds of thugs, also very clearly demonstrates two other things:

a) The great success that the IRM must be having and the great danger its must pose to the GBC for them to have had to resort to such extreme measures.
be) The fact that the GBC know that philosophically, and in the courts, they have been and will be defeated, thus forcing them to go down the only route that is left, and which is always the last refuge of the dishonest scoundrel - violence and force.

Fortunately, whatever the route the GBC-Guru 'goonda's decide to take, they cannot and will not succeed. For as we said when we opened this article:

"Sat Vijay" Truth is victorious!

Thank you for taking the time to read this newsletter, and please keep your letters, and e-mail addresses of other devotees who should be added to our list, flowing in.  A hard copy of our main position paper 'The Final Order' is available on request.  All other IRM papers can be accessed through the EDITORIAL SECTION of the IRM website at:

http://farsight.members.beeb.net or http://come.to/irm