Krishna's Errant Disciples

OF late, the International Society of Krishna Consciousness, ISKCON, has been in the public consciousness for all the wrong reasons. It has been besieged by a torrent of allegations of sexual misconduct from all over the world. But Sripada Gopal Krishna Goswami, a member of ISKCON's governing body commission, points to the past. "There's a story of an ascetic who meditated underwater to avoid worldly desires. But even there, he was distracted by the sight of mating fish. Temptations have pursued and got the better of holy men over the ages and these are more trying times than ever. So why this hue and cry about a few deviant gurus in our movement?" he argues.

Gopal Krishna knows he has a tough assignment: to convince the world that the 32-year-old movement is still thriving. Handing out a typed rejoinder to the allegations being made by disgruntled followers in publications in India and abroad, the unhappy sanyasi observes: "After all is said and done, remember it is the Kaliyuga."

Kaliyuga seems to have more than caught up with the Hare Krishna people. Sleazy sex scandals involving gurus, allegations of child abuse by teachers at ISKCON gurukuls, a cyberwar on the Net regarding the rot in the movement's leadership and a revolt of sorts by disgusted followers have the Krishna Society in a tizzy.

The rumblings of discontent erupted onto the front pages when a New York Times report outlined past instances of child abuse at ISKCON-run boarding schools in India and the US. Significantly, the report detailing widespread physical, emotional and sexual abuse of children attending the gurukuls in the '70s and the '80s was based on a candid expose published in the movement's own official journal. Former pupils had testified to regular beatings, molestation and homosexual rape at knife-point by teachers.

That brought a spate of charges into the open. There were allegations that a guru, Loknath Swami, had molested a disciple's teenage daughter at the latter's New Jersey residence. That former governing body chairman Harikesa Swami had eloped with a German sex worker, and had also embezzled the group. That a guru of Italian origin, Anand Swami, had recently eloped with the daughter of an Indian diplomat residing near Delhi. That another, Hansduta Swami, had married his own disciple. That Guru Kirti Anand is currently doing time in a US prison for child abuse.

"The list is long and disgusting. Yet if you see it in the context of over a million dedicated followers that the movement has, it speaks of the havoc that a few frauds are wreaking in what is otherwise a sincere bid to revive faith and discipline in today's world," says Vineet Narain, a vociferous member of the ISKCON Reform Group, which aims to tackle the menace.

Chatur Bahu Das, a Seattle-based follower, sees false renunciation aimed at "elevation" in the spiritual ranks as the reason for the moral decadence among some in the group's leadership: "In their warped minds, many of these gurus think being a sanyasi is better than being a householder. So, without any ability to control their desires and with the frightening power to influence so many people, they take to becoming gurus. But their basics are wrong. Here are men who haven't the ability to add two plus two and the system has allowed them to progress into calculus. The fallout is going to be bad publicity and, even worse, bad feeling."

ISKCON is no stranger to controversy. Often perceived in its three decades of existence as either an exotic offshoot of the flower-power generation or as a secret wing of the CIA in India, it has time and again generated scepticism. The opulence of its marble temples and air-conditioned offices, the dollar-funded social work, even the elaborate visiting cards have aroused suspicion. The more tolerant indulgently dismissed it as a fringe religion attracting wacky westerners in search of a religious fad. But the group does have clout, testified by the fact that it got Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to inaugurate its plush temple in East of Kailash, south Delhi, in April 1998.

Over the years, ISKCON has managed to live down its Dum maro dum image and boost membership worldwide. Increasingly influential in east European countries, growing rapidly in India and with a million-plus adherents, it has made Krishna's name familiar the world over. Its followers, householders and sanyasis, have been mar-velled at for sticking with the movement and its strict regimen for years. "We have maintained high standards of purity. Undesirable elements and controversies have come and gone," says Gopal Krishna.

Those controversies have made ISKCON adept at fire-fighting. As a start to tackling the new problem, it is disassociating itself from most of the "fallen" gurus generating the sensational stories. Hints are also dropped about "vested interests" and a "handful of people" who want to destroy the movement by overhyping what ISKCON calls "temporary lapses".

But such moves appear inadequate in the point and click age. With disgruntled followers updating the Vaisnava News Network on the Net on a daily basis, allegations, confessions and debates are coming out of the woodwork faster than they can be eliminated. The website, in fact, makes for some shocking reading with articles like "Do it till you are blue in the face", "New Information Regarding Child Abuse" and "Sanyasa Reform—Option to Get married?" among others.

DISTURBING though they are, the allegations of sexual misconduct are but a symptom of a deeper malaise. The root of the problem apparently is a tussle over the powers of the movement's new gurus, who have flourished since the demise of founder Srila Prabhupada in 1977. The Reform Group claims that in the "Final Orders" given by Prabhupada, he had named 11 disciples who would be ritwiks or representatives of the acharya. The order, they say, was suppressed and modified over time to make the ritwiks almost on par with the founder himself.

 "Over time, there have been some 100 gurus, some 30 fallen gurus and some still to be detected as fallen. The movement is as much theirs as ours and we won't let them play around with our trust and faith," says Jay Narain Das, an ISKCON member based in Los Angeles.

But the defences are high and well thought-out. Access to computers and the media, counters Panchratna Das of the "spiritual headquarters" of ISKCON in West Bengal's Mayapur, can't be confused with access to Truth. "In Kaliyuga, the age of quarrel and strife, some people are bound to fight. Some will give in to temptations. You can't reject a movement for that," he observes. The Reform Group agrees but points out that the movement is suffering hugely because of these aberrations. "They have to be weeded out. Because they have the powers to destroy people and lives."

 Over a million people, over a million lives. In 500 centres across the world. In the name of Lord Krishna.