Remember a posting about Srimad Bhagavatam set distribution in Sri Lanka at schools? (Read it below)
Well, today I saw how they do it. Amazing. I’m in Sri Lanka for a week. The day after I arrived I was taken to a meeting of government officers, where the devotees were going to distribute sets.
Six of us went into the meeting room, and about ten people at the front stood waiting to enthusiastically put garlands on us. A very respectful, good way to start.
About a hundred people were in the room for our presentation. We started with a kirtan. Then I spoke about the glories of the Bhagavatam.
I said, “There is so much news about the world. It’s not good news. But the Bhagavatam is good news, in fact, it’s great news, because it gives us direction how be completely happy and satisfied and then go to the spiritual world.
Vasudeva Datta Prabhu then glorified some great personalities from Bhagavatam. He also mentioned the Fifth Canto, where we find out how to avoid the hellish planets. After speaking, he offered the set to the people. Twenty-five people came forward to get a set. I couldn’t believe it. Never before had I experienced anything like it. In an hour we distributed twenty-six sets. We were all in bliss.
I asked them if that was the best day they’ve had, and they said, “No, one day we distributed thirty-two sets.”
How Krsna revealed this type of set distribution is interesting. Devotees were going door to door distributing Bhagavad Gitas. When they came to a school, they thought, “Let’s try to distribute to the principal. He was pious, so he suggested that the devotees meet the whole staff the next day and said he would arrange it. The devotees were very happy to hear this and agreed. The next day they distributed forty Gitas to the school staff. Then they started thinking, “School teachers are intelligent and not poor, so let’s try full sets.” It worked, and now they’re also going to banks, companies, and hospitals. Last year the distributed 408 SB sets.
Your servant,
Vijaya Dasa
More photos: https://goo.gl/AVbDgU
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The devotees in Batticaloa, Sri Lanka, have come up with one of the most innovative book distribution techniques I’ve seen. They go to a school and arrange with the principal to speak to all the teachers, sometimes thirty or forty of them. The devotees explain the glories of the Srimad-Bhagavatam, and because the teachers are all educated and Sri Lanka is steeped in Vedic culture, they understand the book’s value. Wherever the devotees go they have great success-sometimes every teacher will take a set. I’m sure Srila Prabhupada is very pleased with this effort. It’s being organized by Srutakirti Dasa, the number four book distributor in the world, with 6,012 book points. And due largely to this ambitious program to sell full Bhagavatam sets, the Batticaloa yatra, though a “maha” small temple (very small), is now the number nine temple in the world! But they’re maha-big with devotion and the desire to distribute Prabhupada’s books.
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