OFFERING OF THE RESULTS From the Bhaktivinode Thakura Monthly Sankirtana Festival of 2011
Offered June 30, 2011
We offer our respectful obeisances unto his Divine Grace Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura whose disappearance day we are observing here today.
Our respectful obeisances are unto you O Vaishnav Thakur, the Great Acharya and 7th Goswami, empowered by Krishna, who envisioned the cooperative spreading of the message of Lord Caitanya all over the world by people of all nations.
You revived the Sankirtana mission of Caitanya Mahaprabhu to spread the Holy Name and envisioned a marketplace for distributing it that would do the highest good to all living beings in this world.
In 1896, in a pioneering spirit, you sent the transcendental teachings of Sri Caitanya beyond the tiny borders of India and to the West in the form of a small booklet you had written in Sanskrit and translated into English called ‘Caitanya Mahaprabhu, His Life and Precepts’
It was you who said:
Jive doya, Krishna-nam-sarva-dharma-sar
“The showing of compassion to all fallen souls by distributing Krsna nama is the essence of all religious principles”
In keeping with your spirit and to continue the work that you started, ISV devotees inspired by HG Vaisesika Prabhu organized an unprecedented international effort over several weeks to recruit a team of over 1,000 members from the Bay Area and different parts of the world to actively distribute transcendental books to spiritually benefit people of the world.
The goals for this Monthly Sankirtana Festival (MSF) were:
- To have at least 1,008 persons go out on book distribution;
- To distribute at least 8,008 books and
- To collect at least $9,000 in Laxmi points
To accomplish these goals, a team of ISV devotees, technically skilled in information and internet technology, created an elaborate website called 7thgoswami.com to facilitate participants worldwide to register their names and report their book scores. Side by side, ISV devotees held Hari Nama Sankirtana performances in Palo Alto and participated in massive book distribution all across the Bay Area over a period of 5 weeks. They went out door-to-door to distribute books through several apartment complexes, went shop-to-shop to distribute Vietnamese books, traveled to university campuses, festival sites and parks, and arranged special Sunday Sankirtana events for adults and kids. The ISV Sunday school kids held their own Kids Sankirtana crossing their goal of 108 distributors and with the help of kids from several schools in India got in all 240 kids to go out on book distribution, distributing in total 2962 books within and outside of ISV.
The MotelGita team dispatched over two thousand Bhagavad Gitas for placement in motels, with participation of devotees from several different states in the US. Books were also distributed books via the smart box placed at various establishments in the Bay Area.
In the international effort, the 7thgoswami website recorded participation of distributors from over 50 countries. Arrangements were made by ISV devotees with several centers in India to provide books to local residents for distribution in the Bhaktivinode Thakura marathon. Inspired by this ISV-sponsored effort, huge participant and book scores were generated by centers in Tirupati, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Pune and other cities.
All the ISV-related scores were compiled and those from the international effort were reported and recorded on the 7thgoswami website.
On this occasion of the divine disappearance day of Bhaktivinode Thakura, we hereby make this offering of the results from this Sankirtana Yagna to our Great Acharya, to Srila Prabhupada and their Lordships. Here’s a summary of the final results. We are pleased to announce that all goals were not only met and surpassed but also smashed.
In all,
- 1818 members (adults and children) participated in a worldwide book distribution effort, a new record for ISV
- ISV devotees on their own distributed 14,492 books, surpassing this year’s goal and last year’s total of 10,048 Books set during the Bhaktivinode Thakura marathon of 2010
- ISV devotees collected $23,776 dollars in Laxmi points (including donations for ISV Books and MotelGita program
- In the International Effort, more than 64,371 books were distributed, as reported on the 7thgoswami website.
On behalf of Team ISV, we would like to thank all participants, all donors who contributed, and all planners of this MSF, without whose hard work and expertise this historic event would not have been possible. Our special thanks go to HG Vaisesika Prabhu whose enthusiasm and inspiration were instrumental in achieving the goals.
Bhaktivinoda Thakura MSF of 1,008 Book Distributors ki Jaya!
Yours in service
Raxit Jariwalla
