720621 - Letter to Giriraja written from Los Angeles

Letters by Date, 1972

Tridandi Goswami
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami
Founder-Acharya:
International Society for Krishna Consciousness
CENTER:
Los Angeles ISKCON

DATE .......June..21,.............19..72

My Dear Giriraj,

Please accept my blessings. I am in due receipt of your letter dated June 13, 1972 and have appreciated its contents very well. I am happy to hear that the men are engaged nicely, especially in the matter of distributing our books. Take any number of books without paying any price, and engage the whole amount for our building work there in Bombay, but the building work must be very superb. Now I have sent you one letter yesterday which I hope by now has cured [handwritten] the situation amongst you all leaders there in Bombay. So if there is neglect or slackening in the building work you may please give all good direction how it may be improved to the topmost standard in all of India. One thing, if our men are making daily between Rs. 30/- and Rs. 120/-, let us say average of Rs. 50/-, so that is Rs. 400-500/- per day, or Rs. 15,000 per month [handwritten] so that is very nice. So in this way you may order increasingly as many books as you can distribute and they will be immediately dispatched to Bombay without any cost to you.
So far foodstuffs, you should collect profusely. If you collect more distribute more, and if you collect less, distribute less, but only distribute what you have collected. If there is no food, do not contribute our own funds for this purpose. Try to collect more, besides there is the contribution of American Government. You should purchase one iron safe and keep the Deities' jewelry or any valuables in that, or an iron closet, a little heavier, and you may keep either in my room or in some special room.
Ahmedabad is a great industrial city. It has got more than 100 big, big mills and if all of the mill-owners and officers become our members, aloka [unclear] [handwritten] from Ahmedabad and other cities in Gujarat, such as Baroda, Surat, Dwarka, Rajkot, like that, you can collect millions of Rs. Also, I remember in Bombay at Akash Ganga there was some invitation from some important persons living near Dakot in Gujarat sometimes before. Whether they have been contacted? If we can open a Center in Dwarka or Dakor, that will be very nice. In Gujarat State we can open a Center in every city because the people are so much dedicated to Krishna. In Gujarat we can very soon make our movement very popular, because [handwritten] by nature they are devotees of Krishna.
There is no question of selling the flats, as you had proposed this idea before of our own men owning the flats and leasing or renting them to devotees. Somehow or other, all of our tenants should be our devotees, and we can give them concession rents, but they should be devotees and at least in our colony there should be no violations of our rules and regulations. Actually make it a Hare Krishna land or a pilgrimage for Vaisnavas and the Indian people in general. I am very much especially pleased that you have had such a nice meeting with Sumati Morarji. She is our old friend and benefactor from long years back, and always she has desired for us to live as her close neighbors. She used to tell me in Bombay two years back that she wanted we should build our temple somewhere nearby to her place. She also assisted Tamal Krishna and Shyamsundar to try to find one house in Juhu for our headquarters several times. So you can mention this fact to her that now we have fulfilled her desire and we are living in close proximity to her, so she should take advantage of Krishna's blessing her with such an opportunity for serving the Lord by herself building our Juhu temple. Encourage her to attend the meetings every day, and if you make the Deity worship very, very opulent and gorgeous, she will automatically be [handwritten] attracted to them. She has no children of her own, so why not she should take Radha and Krishna as her Children? So you can propose gradually and tactfully that she can alone build up a wonderful temple in our property and we shall name it "Sumati Temple" or "Sumati Hall". So encourage her [handwritten] in this way, and I am very much engladdened that she is so much willing to help us, now you apply yourself to the matter very diligently and think always of Krishna and it will come out very auspiciously. You can ask her to write me her itinerary in [handwritten] London, or if you think so, I will send her a letter personally. You can tell her that I shall be in London during that time also. I am leaving here on morning of July 2nd and arriving London July 5th via New York. I shall be very glad to see her and bring her in our temple there. Or she can write to me when she is there c/o 7 Bury Place. That is a good proposal to receive her at London Airport. Somehow or other, either she pays for the temple herself or she raises the funds from others, she must be persuaded in this great project, which will bring great benefit to her [handwritten] countryman and which will attract many, many foreign devotees of Krishna to the Indian soil for taking up this spiritual life very seriously. It is a unique temple in the world, and if you show your wonderful abilities as American and European boys and girls to manage everything superbly, she [handwritten] will not hesitate to entrust you in every way. Therefore, there must always be good will and cooperation amongst yourselves for this huge task ahead. I always think of our Juhu place, and I want that it shall be the model for all the world to emulate and respect as the perfect example of a Krishna Conscious community. The temple will cost about 2 lakhs, more or less, so Sumati Morarji can pay easily.
That is a good idea to print the articles which I have written and insert with photos and advertisements. Visakha will be the leader of designing pamphlets, and she has written also one article, "Hero of India," and [handwritten] she has written it very nicely. One thing is, in one letter to you some days back I gave you notice to send Rs. 1,000/- to Puri Maharaj to his address in Rajhmundry, so if you have not yet sent, do so immediately. After sending, write to me the acknowledgement.
So far your question regarding the regulative principles of our devotional life, you can request all the disciples there that this is our life, so why they will not follow? If there is any discrepancy in this matter, you may send me the names. And for Sannyasis such discipline is a must.
If Mr. Chhabria wants to send a Sanskrit teacher there, he can teach Ramanuga and he may teach in a class also, I have no objection, but without salary. Our work is honorary.
Hoping this will meet you in good health,

Your ever well-wisher,

A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami

ACBS/sda

Giriraj das Brahmachary, c/o ISKCON Bombay