Bsdm

Contents MEETING WITH B. S. DAMODARA SWAMI We, Maharaja, myself and Abhimanyu Das, ran out of the building on Parnassus Street and were racing by auto to South San Francisco, were we had to meet a Nobel Laureate before he went to the airport, but there was a document that need photo-copying that we had to give him.

I was already behind the wheel, knowing best how to get there, but Maharaja was in anxiety about the doc and losing time to find a copier.

“Here, give it to me, wait a minute”, I said with aplomb, as I skidded into a five- minute loading zone in front of the University and hit the pavement to run.

Back in a flash, with the cash, we pulled away and met the deadline.

Later Abhimanyu told me that Maharaja had said, “If I had a second assistant like Hanumat Swami, I could fly”.

Well some reminiscences might make us cry, but I guess that is normal. We all have our bright moments, but a lot of bad habits to still resolve, no?

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We first met Maharaja, B. S. Damodara Swami, when we went to India for the first time in 1978. We all landed in Delhi on the same airplane and Riktananda Das and I went ahead to look for a bus or taxi to Braja but Maharaja, a Brahmacari then, waited to collect his projector and other things before he went.

Later Prabhupada sent a letter to all the Temple Presidents that the name of any member who had a BA degree or higher should be given to Maharaja, but our Temple President concealed the fact about us and when we asked about joining the Bhaktivedanta Institute he had our GBC write to us saying that doing the needful service was higher than doing something that we wanted to do because of our material qualification.

Guess it was all Krsna’s arrangement, seems so. Then Maharaja brought the Institute to San Francisco to work with Atreya Rsi Das when Hansadutta Swami was our GBC in Berkeley, 1979?

Of course, we naturally began to associate with them and went to India with Maharaja in 1984 when our Zonal Guru system fell apart. It was a riot: The Bhaktivedanta Institute. We formed the Articles of Incorporation, were one of the members of the Board of Directors along with Maharaja, Rasaraja Das et al. Then helped produce the First and Second World Congresses for a Synthesis of Science and Religion. We also were Co-Directors of Ranga-niketan, Manipuri Theater Troupe, and maybe one of the first white men to go to Manipur since the British Raj.

What other experiences did we have with Maharaja that would reveal his character? I guess one of the most prominent was our experience of his disappearance, death. Would you really like to hear about that? ON DISAPPEARANCE OF B. S. DAMODARA SWAMI We were in Srila Prabhupada’s Samadhi before the Mangala-arati and Manjari Devi Dasi came in with anxiety, and told us the news, “Have you heard? Bhakti Svarupa Damodara Maharaja has left his body?”

Our first, spontaneous reaction was a little strange, “Oh, how nice! At last, Maharaja will get some relief!” We knew how much pressure he was under in his relations with the GBC’s administrative work, his guiding his Disciples, the politics and terrorism in Manipur, preaching to the Scientists.

We worked with a few others about the practical arrangement. I think we contacted Dr. Samaresh Banyopadhyay whose nephew was a doctor who wrote the death certificate. Then there was the transport of his body to Braja, and discussion where it should be laid to rest, Manipur, Braja, and finally it arrived and was put into Samadhi in his little Temple in Radha-kunda. Everyone was crying and consoling each other, but we felt strange that we didn’t feel much separation. We were feeling that Maharaja had not gone, he was still with any of us, just as much as before, if anyone wanted to help him in the work he was doing.

That feeling went on all through the finally Darsan in Krsna Balarama Temple, the Samadhi services etc., and then that evening after we came back from Radha- kunda there was a little memorial session in the Kedia land behind the Temple. Lokanatha Swami, Gopal-krsna Swami, others were speaking about the glories of Maharaja and then we were asked me to speak and I started to and then it hit us. All the memories of the wonderful association we had with Maharaja came back, and we realized that those were finished. There would not be any more of those. We never have had any association with a more cultured, exotic gentleman since then in our life. A wave of lamentation hit us and it was all we could do to sit-up and not cry. We just kind of nodded, “No”, to the Gopal-krsna Maharaja’s request for us to take the mike. He looked a little surprised at us and then called upon someone else.

Our memories of Maharaja are technical in terms of how Prabhupada taught him to preach, and also very personal and gentle, in how he showed us how to live. He was from an aristocratic culture, Manipur, and by nature had a presence that we did not find in any other member of ISKCON. Of course, we loved him, so that must have influenced how we saw him, but probably it is an objective fact also. HOW TO PREACH TO THE RASCAL (AND GENTLE) SCIENTISTS