Srila Prabhupada returns to the city of his birth, accompanied by his “dancing white elephants.”
By Rajasekhara Dasa Brahmachari
The people of Calcutta happily welcome Srila Prabhupada’s “dancing white elephants.”
Excerpted from Calcutta — City of Divine Grace: An Historical Memoir of the Period 1510 to 1977, by Rajasekhara Dasa Brahmachari. Copyright: © 2023 Vedanta Vision Publications.
This excerpt, taken from Chapter Seven, retains the book’s style for Sanskrit and other considerations. The book is available at amazon.com and rasbiharilal.com.
On August 29th, 1970, His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada returned to Calcutta for the first time in almost three years. He chose his hometown as the springboard for spreading the Hare Krishna movement in India with the purpose of inundating the subcontinent with the chanting of the holy names of Krishna:
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama, Rama Rama Hare Hare
Shrila Prabhupada was arriving in India with his ‘World Sankirtana Party’ including over forty of his disciples from America. Waiting on the airfield tarmac to greet him were his devoted followers Achyutananda and Jayapataka. As soon as the plane taxied to a halt and passengers began to disembark, Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada descended the plane’s stairway. Achyutananda and Jayapataka bowed down before their spiritual master offering their obeisances. Shrila Prabhupada smiled radiantly as he warmly embraced both of them.
Shrila Prabhupada was accompanied on the flight from Los Angeles by many of his senior sannyasi disciples who were the core of his World Sankirtana Party, which would soon capture the attention of the public with their infectious zeal for performing hari-nama sankirtana and propagating Krishna consciousness. From the runway tarmac, Prabhupada was taken in a flower-bedecked car to the airport terminal building where he was ushered into the VIP lounge. A large group of relatives and old friends were there to welcome him along with a large kirtana party of brahmacharis from the Chaitanya Saraswat Matha who were chanting the Hare Krishna mantra. The reception in the VIP lounge was a truly festive affair, as the large gathering of well-wishers was overjoyed to see Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada once again after so many years. Other passengers in the airport were also swept away by the exuberance of the welcome-home party as everyone chanted the holy names and danced in spiritual bliss. There were also a number of reporters from the local newspapers who were waiting to interview Shrila Prabhupada.
As Prabhupada sat down to address the gathering, many came forward to place flower garlands around his neck. In fact, there were so many garlands that Prabhupada had to remove some to make way for others. But the garlands kept coming and were almost completely covering Prabhupada’s face. The sweet fragrance of the jasmine flowers mixed with wafts of exotic incense permeated the airport building. The crowds pressed in closer as many tried to touch Prabhupada’s feet while asking for his blessings. When the hari-nama kirtana came to an end, the crowds sat around as Shrila Prabhupada began to speak. “I am coming back to the city after three years. Hare Krishna. I have been around the world and have found that happiness and peace cannot be established in this world by materialistic advancement. I have seen Japan, which is highly advanced in machines and technology. Yet there is no real happiness there. But the people of India, even if they do not understand the significance of sankirtana, they enjoy listening to it. My advice to the Indians is that if you advance only in science and technology, without paying attention to hari-nama, then you will remain forever backward. There is tremendous strength in hari-nama . . .”
Reporter: You have said, and I quote, “Even communism, if it is without Krishna-nama, is void.” Why do you say that?
Prabhupada: Why do you refer to communism in particular? Without Krishna consciousness, everything is void. Whatever you do, Krishna must remain in the centre. Whether you are communist or capitalist or anything else—it doesn’t matter. We want to see whether your activities are centred around Krishna.
Reporter: Right now, there is too much turmoil in Bengal. What is your advice to us at this time?
Prabhupada: My advice is to chant Hare Krishna. This is the piece of advice to both the capitalists and the communists. All animosity between them will cease completely, and all their problems will be solved, if they take this advice.
The crowd, affirming Shrila Prabhupada’s words, began to chant in unison, “Sadhu! Sadhu!” which in Indian culture is the traditional way of approving a saintly person’s prophetic words.
Once the airport reception was over, Prabhupada was escorted to a nearby waiting car and along with three of his disciples, headed to the ISKCON centre on Hindustan Road, where he would reside during his stay in the city. The other devotees who arrived with Prabhupada followed in a cavalcade of vehicles. As Prabhupada looked out from the car windows, familiar scenes of Calcutta passed by.
However, for the American devotees who were first-time visitors to the city, Calcutta was very foreign and unfamiliar. The devotees felt the sultry monsoon climate to be almost stifling. Stray cows could be seen loitering everywhere, sometimes lying in the middle of the road, forcing traffic to navigate around them. Sturdy white bullocks pulled heavily loaded carts as barefoot ricksha- pullers, frantically ringing their hand-bells, weaved their way through the congested traffic. The devotees were shocked to see an overcrowded double-decker bus, leaning heavily on one side from the uneven weight caused by passengers clinging on to the sides. Horse-drawn carriages, a throwback from the old Victorian era of British India, rattled by in the opposite direction. The convoy of devotee cars got stuck behind one of Calcutta’s archaic electric trams as it slowly chugged along the rusty rails, forcing traffic to quickly move out of its way.
The sidewalks were teeming with people as shops and markets remained open until late at night. The spicy aroma from roadside eateries often wafted into the cars as they drove past. Mangy-looking dogs could be seen fighting for food-scraps in the gutters, as beggars with tattered clothing sat in lines outside temples and mosques, competing for the few paisa that was being offered. Although a familiar scene for Prabhupada, his Western disciples might have thought they were driving through a surrealistic movie-set from the 1920s. It appeared from their surroundings, they had gone back in time a hundred years or more, and were obviously experiencing some degree of culture shock. Tamala Krishna, sitting in the front seat, looked nervously at the driver, as he swerved in and out of traffic while wildly honking his horn. Prabhupada laughed. “Tamala Krishna, how do you like this driving?” It was Tamala Krishna’s first time in Calcutta, whereas Achyutananda and Jayapataka, sitting next to Prabhupada in the back seat, had become acclimatized and had learned to adapt to the city’s unique environment.
It was getting close to midnight before Shrila Prabhupada and his party reached the ISKCON centre at 37/1, Hindustan Road. There were many well-wishers waiting to greet him, but his secretary, Devananda Maharaja, thinking that Prabhupada would be tired from the journey and needing to rest, tried to turn them away. Seeing the situation, Prabhupada said, “No, no, let them come in.” Shrila Prabhupada’s sister, Bhavatarini, also arrived carrying an array of traditional Bengali dishes she had cooked. “We can’t eat now,” one of the sannyasis protested. “It’s very late at night.” “No,” Prabhupada said, “we must eat everything. Whatever my sister cooks, we have to eat. This is her favourite activity. She likes to cook for me and feed me. Everyone must take prasadam.” As Prabhupada and his disciples were honouring the prasadam prepared by his sister, some devotees from the Chaitanya Saraswat Matha arrived with a feast they had cooked in honour of Prabhupada’s return to Calcutta, and after taking some of that prasadam, Prabhupada induced his disciples and guests to eat sumptuously. This was a special occasion of his homecoming and regardless of the time, everyone should celebrate by partaking of the feast.
The day after Shrila Prabhupada’s arrival, the city’s leading newspaper, the Amrita Bazar Patrika, carried a front-page story of Prabhupada’s arrival in Calcutta. A photo showed Prabhupada walking with his hand in his bead bag, surrounded by young Western sannyasis carrying their sannyasa-dandas. The newspaper article stated. “Many VIP’s have come to Dumdum Airport before, but never have we seen such gaiety and celebrations of this magnitude . . . It was difficult to imagine that he was 75 years old, because he was completely fresh after this long journey. With a little smile on his face, he blessed one and all with the word, ‘Hari Bol!’”
The news coverage in so many leading newspapers about Shrila Prabhupada’s arrival in Calcutta created an extremely positive impression of the Hare Krishna movement. Everyone was interested in learning more about ISKCON and how Shrila Prabhupada had single-handedly converted the youth of America to become followers of Vaishnava dharma.
Shrila Prabhupada had arrived back in Calcutta at a time when the city was facing political turmoil due to the threat posed by the Naxalite movement. This group of radical socialists had been instigating riots in many parts of Bengal. The murder of prominent businessmen was a daily affair and quite a few of them were leaving the city out of fear for their lives. Many guests who met Shrila Prabhupada on his return to the city voiced their concern about the violence and unrest in Calcutta. Prabhupada told them that the only shelter was Krishna. “People are in very much perturbed condition. All of them are expecting me to do something for ameliorating the situation, but I am simply advising them to chant Hare Krishna because this transcendental sound is the only panacea for all material diseases.” Prabhupada saw no need to fabricate a special program for the social problems of Calcutta. Chanting Hare Krishna was “the only panacea for all material diseases.”
Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada had already envisioned a master-plan for the spiritual rejuvenation of not only Calcutta, but for the whole of the Indian sub-continent. He had come with his leading disciples and many more would be arriving from the West within days. He had ordered lakhs of rupees’ worth of his books and also Back to Godhead magazines from the printer, Dai Nippon in Japan. His sannyasi disciples would be going out daily into the streets of Calcutta and other major cities of India to perform kirtana and distribute these books amongst the people. Prabhupada’s American disciples would now become the medium for presenting Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s divine gift, the holy name of Krishna, the panacea for all material diseases.
East Meets West on Chowringhee
Shrila Prabhupada sent his disciples every day into Calcutta to perform hari-nama kirtana and they were getting a very good response from the local people. These same devotees who had been chanting Hare Krishna in the streets of San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York were now chanting and dancing along Chowringhee, the Esplanade, and in Dalhousie Square. Large crowds gathered to see the amazing spectacle of shaven-headed Westerners with shikhas and tilaka, playing karatalas and mridanga drums, as they danced in ecstasy chanting the holy names:
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama, Rama Rama Hare Hare
For the Bengalis, this was completely sensational, and hundreds would gather every day to watch the Westerners performing kirtana. Shrila Prabhupada already knew the great appeal his disciples would have and everyone in Calcutta would want to see them. He therefore affectionately called them his “dancing white elephants.” In ancient India, as well as in other Southeast-Asian countries like Burma and Thailand, the wealth of the king was calculated by how many elephants he owned, and his prestige is increased by the number of white elephants he owned. This was because a white elephant is the rarest amongst all elephants and extremely valuable, and people would flock just to get a glimpse of such a white elephant. Therefore, because large crowds came to see the white-skinned Americans chanting and dancing in the street, Shrila Prabhupada affectionately referred to his disciples as his “dancing white elephants.” Shrila Prabhupada also said that when Indians, who were imitating western culture, see that the Westerners were seriously taking to Krishna consciousness, they would soon realize the value of their own culture.
Jayapataka: Prabhupada came from America with his shaven-headed Western disciples with shikhas and tilaka, and wearing saffron robes and saris. It was a triumphant return. These alien-looking devotees chanted Hare Krishna in the streets with great enthusiasm, like Shri Chaitanya’s followers some 500 years earlier. India had never seen anything like it. Hundreds would gather just to get a glimpse of these Western saints, whom Prabhupada called his “dancing white elephants.”
Prabhupada explained to his disciples how formerly, during the time of Maharaja Yudhisthira, India had been a Krishna conscious state. For the last thousand years, however, India had been under foreign subjugation, first under the Mohammedans and then under the British. As a result, the intelligentsia, and to a lesser degree, the masses of India, had lost respect for their own culture. They were now pursuing the materialistic goals of the Western world, which they saw as being more productive than their old religious way of life. The foreign rulers had ridiculed Indian religion as nothing more than sentimentalism based on mythology.
Prabhupada knew that when the Indians see that Westerners were living the life of renounced Vaishnavas, strictly following the Vedic principles governing religious life, it could turn their heads and hearts, and in this way, help them regain faith in their own culture. Prabhupada always stressed that his disciples must be pure in their actions and this would be their spiritual force.
On May 13 this year, while this issue of BTG was in the final stages of layout, Rajasekhara Dasa Brahmachari passed away in Sri Mayapur Dhama, surrounded by devotees chanting the holy names. He was initiated by Srila Prabhupada in 1973 at the Bhaktivedanta Manor, outside London. In January 1975 he traveled to Vrindavan, where he became one of the first pujaris at ISKCON’S newly opened Krishna-Balaram Mandir. During his fifty years in India, he visited every important holy place throughout the country. He was a leading authority on Vrindavan Dhama.
Source: https://btg.krishna.com/world-sankirtana-party-arrives-in-calcutta/
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