Prabhupāda Vigil – November 1, 1977, Vṛndāvana

What activities going on, just describe

Prabhupada: [Transl. There was some problem in Pondicherry?]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. The entire asrama belongs to Aurobinda.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Hmm. I have heard that there was some party dispute?]

Sri Bajaj: [Transl. There was some dispute, but not the party dispute. It was due to some other reasons.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. I see.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Some political reason arose.]

Sri Bajaj: [Transl. Some political reason arose.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Auroville is being set up.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. What?]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. An international center called Auroville has been set up. Some people from there have created some disturbance. Some foreigners have come to stay there. Now they are saying-we are independent. We have no connection with Aurobinada society something like that.]

Sri Bajaj: [Transl. We want something like Vatican city.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. We want independence.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. I see.]

Sri Bajaj: [Transl. Since few years, at that place Aurobinda...]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Did you take some water?]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Yes.]

Sri Bajaj: [Transl. Yes.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Aurobindo Society, that is also, Gita.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. That is also promoting Gita.]

Sri Bajaj: [Transl. Without Gita.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Aurobindoji has put more stress on Gita.]

Shri Bajaj: [Transl. Aurobindo has made a condition. Those who seek divine guidance from within, they will be eligible for admission. They must have this goal in mind. The essence of Gita is to seek divine guidance from the consciousness. To live in Auroville one must be the willing survitor of the divine consciousness. This is his words.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. I see.]

Sri Bajaj: [Transl. Divine consciousness and the Krsna consciousness is one and the same thing.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Everything is Same.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. What is your opinion? Gita Pratisthana.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Yes?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. What is your aim?]

Sri Bajaj: [Transl. He means what is the aim of Gita Pratisthana.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. The aim of Gita Pratisthana is to learn and preach the message of Gita. To bring all the different institutions related to Gita to a common platform and introduce them to one another. Work together and secure a combined effort in this direction. Let the message of Gita be spread all over the world. This is the goal of Gita Pratisthana. Just like, you say that we don't want to get involved with anyone's interpretation, we want to present Gita as it is in all the languages of the world, similarly we want to encourage everyone and preach the teachings of Gita in a pure way. We don't want to get involved in the dispute of the different interpretation.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. The Supreme Personality of Godhead, Krsna is saying-manmana bhava mad-bhakto mad-yaji mam namaskuru. These four things He teaches us. Always think of the Supreme Lord, manmana, become a devotee of the Supreme Lord. mam evaisyasi satyam te sarva-dharman parityajya. Simple thing. There is no complication.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Yes. It is very clear.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Spiritual order of life exists. The social order of life-catur-varnyam maya srstam. Catur-varnyam-brahmana, ksatriya, vaisya, sūdra, carry out their respective duties. And krsi-go-raksya-vanijyam, samo damas tapaḥ saucam brahma-karma svabhava-jam. sauryam tejo dhrtir daksyam-these are the qualities of the ksatriyas. This is our aim. This will bring good result. Without interpretation, as it is, if it is preached then there will be a great deal of benefit to the whole world.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Can be beneficial to the whole world.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. This is our message. You all should consider this.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Is your plan of going to Mayapur fixed? Perhaps it is not sure yet.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. It is sure.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Now your health condition should improve.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Whether the health is good or not, as long as the body is there...]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. In last ten/ twelve years, the mission has expanded so much by the mercy of the Supreme Lord and your hard work and blessings. We think that to give momentum to this mission it is very important to keep your physical condition sound.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. My duration of life is finished. As long as it goes on. According to the Astrological calculation there is no more duration of life left. Eighty-one years of life. One has to die one day.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. That is right. Everyone has to go one day.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. We have got a very big set up there also. You all visit there one time. There, how many men we can accommodate?]

Devotees: About forty rooms, at least a hundred people, one hundred people.

Prabhupada: Where?

Devotee: In the guest house.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Where? In Mayapur?]

Devotees: [Transl. Oh Mayapur.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Svamiji is asking about where?]

Devotee: In Mayapur we can accommodate easily a thousand.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Easily a thousand.]

Devotee: May be more.

Prabhupada: In Mayapur, to welcome people from the world. [Transl. That is the desire.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Is it already done or under construction?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Yes.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Most of it is already built?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. The whole thing is already built. What is the length of the house?]

Svarūpa Damodara: What is the length of the house? Mayapur.

Devotee: 768 feet.

Svarūpa Damodara: 768 feet.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Of the house?]

Devotees: [Transl. Yes. Length of the building.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Length of the building?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. One building.]

Devotees: [Transl. That's one building.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. One building.]

Devotee: Yes. Very long. It is the longest building in West Bengal.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Is it the main temple?]

Devotee: No, Guest House.

Prabhupada: Guest House.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Guest House. I see. There is also a large temple there no?]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Yes.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. You told me before. We will certainly come there someday. It is two hours from Calcutta I believe.]

Devotee: [Transl. Two to two and half hours. Maximum three hours.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. In which District?]

Prabhupada & Devotees: Nadia.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Nadia. Nadia District. At least one time we should make a plan. We should go and see the place.]

Devotee: [Transl. You must come. It is a very nice place.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. In India, we have in three places. One is in Mayapur, one in Vrindavan.]

Devotee: [Transl. And Bombay.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. And Bombay. You have seen the Bombay temple.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. We have seen the Bombay temple.]

Sri Bajaj: [Transl. Recently during Janmastami we were there at night.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Oh.]

Sri Bajaja: [Transl. In the temple. We attended satsahga, prasada, puja, prayers etc.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. Did you like it?]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Did you like it?]

Sri Bajaj: [Transl. Yes. We liked it. It was very nice.]

Bhavananda: Srila Prabhupada, you called for me?

Prabhupada: No, I was asking how many men we can accommodate in the new building?

Bhavananda: Comfortably we can accommodate five to six hundred men in first-class rooms with first-class pakka prasadam.

Shri Bajaj: That's already established, and people are already...

Bhavananda: Yes, it's already established.

Shri Bajaj: Functioning.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. They have built a huge...]

Shri Bajaj: [Transl. Yes. Very big.] But you have plans to further expand and add many more buildings and temples. Because I've seen the big plan.

Bhavananda: Yes. Prabhupada has made a plan for fifty thousand devotees to live there.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. To live there?]

Bhavananda: Yes.

Shri Bajaj: Fifty thousand devotees in one place.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. They have a plan for self-reliant village industry, handicraft, cow-dung gas plant, they told us like that. Don't have electricity even I think.]

Prabhupada: What activities going on, just describe. Bhavananda?

Devotee: What activities going on?

Bhavananda: At Mayapur now we have two hundred resident devotees. We have the handloom; we have our own handloom production. We have prasadam distribution to the local people on the weekends. Two to three thousand people a day are given prasadam, and during the week seven hundred to a thousand take full prasadam.

Sri Narayana: Free? All free distribution.

Bhavananda: Yes. And we have our gurukula, mainly local boys, resident boarding, no day students. When I left there were eighty-five boys. Probably it's increased.

Sri Narayana: All local.

Bhavananda: All local. Our international gurukula is here. There is local.

Sri Narayana: This is the international, here.

Bhavananda: This gurukula is international, and our gurukula in Mayapur is mainly local Bengali boys, many coming from brahmana families, very nice.

Sri Narayana: Then any industries? Hand industries?

Bhavananda: Our handloom.

Sri Narayana: Handloom.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. And farming?]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. Farming, there will be Dairy, Goshala.]

Bhavananda: And our gosala is just developing. That area of Mayapur, Navadvipa, is a big handloom...

Sri Narayana: Yes, handloom area.

Bhavananda: Many handloomers. So we have designs to expand that into a very large area, and most of it will be exported to our temples and devotees all around the world. And all of the handloom workers, they're devotees, so they don't take any salary. None of us take any salary. And they get nice rooming and full prasadam, and their children are educated. All medicine, everything is supplied to them.

Sri Narayana: You could also, perhaps, introduce this new spinning wheel for the yarn. At present you must be purchasing yarn from the mills.

Bhavananda: Yes.

Sri Narayana: But have you seen this small nice charkha, spinning wheel?

Bhavananda: Well, we do our own spinning.

Sri Narayana: Spinning also?

Bhavananda: Oh, yes. We're training up those who have children... They're trained in the varnasrama system. Some of the children in the school have a scholastic bent of mind, so they're educated in Sanskrit and higher studies. Some of them have a vaisya bent of mind, and they work in the gosala helping to develop..., milk the cows. Some are... Their parents are working in the handloom. They also have that desire, so they're trained to be handloomers. In this way we will be able to develop a city of fifty thousand devotees.

Shri Bajaj: Let us not overstrain him and whatever, if... He'll feel tired.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. No he said...]

Prabhupada: Thank you very much.

Sri Narayana: [Transl. People from all countries have come for the conference. We especially want that they should see your institution and work. They liked it very much.]

Prabhupada: [Transl. All of you come sometimes to Nadia, Mayapur.]

Sri Narayana: [Transl. We will come.]

Svarūpa Damodara: We have our main festival in Mayapur at the end of March, March 24th.

Sri Narayana: March 24th?

Bhavananda: This year? Dola-yatra. Gaura-pūrnima.

Svarūpa Damodara: Our biggest festival. All the devotees from all over the world...

Prabhupada: Recently there was a scientific meeting here. Where is that Statesman report?

Sri Narayana: The report from..., about Mayapur? Some literature?

Prabhupada: No, here. We... Just describe.

Svarūpa Damodara: We had a science conference here in gurukula just about a little more than a week ago.

Sri Narayana: Here in this new building?

Svarūpa Damodara: Yes, the same building, at the same hall that you're going to hold your conference. I invited several scholars, scientists around Delhi and Agra. Also Srila Prabhupada's disciples, scientist disciples, came from around the world. The basic theme was to show that life is coming from the supreme life. In other words, everything is coming from Krsna. But modern science says that we are just product of atoms and molecules.

Hamsadūta: This is an article which was published in The Statesman, October 22nd,

Sri Narayana: I see.

Hamsadūta: ...which covers this meeting. It says, "The Non-Physical View on the Origin of Species. Materialists and men of faith continue to disagree over the origins of life. According to the first group, life is derived from atom and molecules..." [break]

[Bhakti-caru and kaviraja-Bengali to end] [end]