Prabhupada disapproves the concept of Umbrella corporation

After two weeks in Mexico City and Caracas, Srila Prabhupada returns to the United States. He stays in a cottage adjacent to the temple, which is the residence of a householder couple. There are posters of devotional paintings from his books on the walls. One particular poster depicts Krishna sitting on the chariot. Arjuna stands behind Him holding his forehead with his left hand. Arjuna looks particularly distressed in this depiction. While looking at the poster, Prabhupada suddenly bursts out in laughter. "Yes, this picture," he says to Srutakirti. "I like this picture very much. This picture is very instructive." "What is that Srila Prabhupada?" "Well, Krishna is saying to Arjuna, 'You must give up everything.' He is telling Arjuna, Give up all your family. You must kill them. You must kill your family members. So this is the point. One has to be ready to give up everything for Krishna and do what Krishna desires. You must be prepared to give up a wife, children, everything. One has to be ready to kill their relatives if Krishna desires, what to speak of giving them up. If Krishna wants, you kill your relatives. This is a devotee. A devotee is prepared to kill their relatives for Krishna. So, at this point, Arjuna is ready. He is having to accept. Then everything is all right. As devotees, we must be able to give up all of these family relationships."

Hearing this explanation, Srutakirti becomes overwhelmed with his own internal turmoil. He is still a newly married man with a wonderful baby boy. He's just embarking on family life and certainly not ready to give it up. He considers this point of surrender too extreme and accepts the fact that he just doesn't understand. Unable to speak, he simply looks down at the ground and quietly says, "Yes, Srila Prabhupada."

Srutakirti: I was tormented with the fact that I left my infant son and young wife. The way His Divine Grace explained Arjuna's dilemma was completely objective. Srila Prabhupada was so expert. He was not telling me to leave my family. He was gently persuading me to come to my own conclusion. There was no indication in his voice that this was my predicament. Yet, it was obvious to me that this was my exact predicament. I was attached and determined to stay with my family. Srila Prabhupada philosophically prepared me to make the important decision that was to come in the near future. I was secure in the fact that my family was being provided for at the Hawaii Temple. It wasn't as if I had abandoned them. I was just called away on a tour of eminent duty. I had only been with Srila Prabhupada for two weeks after leaving Hawaii. I took comfort knowing that when His Divine Grace left the United States, I would be back in the loving arms of my family.

Tamal Krishna Goswami has flown into Miami and is at the temple this evening to hear Prabhupada's Bhagavad-gita class. For a change, Prabhupada is giving evening Gita classes instead of his usual morning Bhagavatam classes. In front of Miami's beautiful Sri-Sri Gaura-Nitai Deities, Prabhupada refers to a question raised in Venezuela. "The other day in Caracas some psychiatrists came. Their question was that, 'The problems of the world are increasing, so what is your prescription to solve these problems?' So the problem is very easy to be solved. I gave the example that this body is there. And there is something which is moving the body, living force. So that living force is the driver of the body, and the body is also described in the Bhagavad-gita as a machine. Actually it is a machine. 'isvarah sarva-bhutanam hrid-dese arjuna tishthati bhramayan sarva-bhutani yantrarudhani mayaya [Bg. 18.61]' Yantra means machine. So we are seated on this machine. This is knowledge. The person who is seated in this car, on the machine, nobody knows. There are so many advancement-of-knowledge departments, but where is the department to understand the living force which is driving this machine? What is that living force? How it is working? There is no enquiry and no education. Therefore this education has no value. They do not know what is education. Education means to enquire about the living force which is moving this body. That is education. This is not education, that we have manufactured nice car or nice machine. That is called craftsmanship. That is not education."

Early the following morning, Srila Prabhupada takes a walk around the temple grounds. Tamal Krishna and Abhirama accompany him. Prabhupada appreciates the property, and is enjoying the fresh fruit that is available in Miami. However, he's a little disturbed because of all the leaves lying on the ground. At one point, Prabhupada stops and inquires from Abhirama. "Why everyone else's yards are clean? Here there are only leaves on the ground" "Well, under the leaves there's nothing but dirt. The leaves keep the dirt from rising." "There are lawns everywhere," Prabhupada points out. "Why here you have dirt" He chastises Abhirama that the grounds should always be kept very clean and the leaves raked. "If you have your own property you may neglect it, but when you are taking care of someone else's property you have to be very careful." The purport is, be very careful to take care of Krishna's property.

Srila Prabhupada launches into ISKCON's management problems. Some GBCs want to centralize the management of the society whereas Prabhupada wants every center to be autonomous and managed individually by local devotees. His point is that if there is an attack against ISKCON one temple may be affected, but if management is centralized then the whole society is jeopardized. His second point is that unless local devotees are in charge of their individual temples, the movement will wither and fade. There are many discussions about organizing ISKCON along business systems popular in America. Jayatirtha and Ramesvara introduce this new direction, and there are good results from moving in that direction. They preach that it's the natural order of things because it's obvious devotees can't carry on as hippies and Prabhupada certainly seems to be endorsing that. They also feel a need to make things consistent, to control things from a mastermind headquarters in Los Angeles, 'Centralization'. But Prabhupada clearly objects to that. He prefers the Ghandian system with each temple separate and autonomous, headed by a strong temple president who would become a leader in the community.

TKG: There was the incident of the Umbrella Corporation, which was already coming to Srila Prabhupada's attention, so he was very disturbed. He said to me, "Why are Jayatirtha and Ramesvara pressing me like this?" He wanted to avoid having all of our corporations under one major corporation because Srila Prabhupada felt that this was actually an attempt by the lawyers to control our society, since they would make the whole thing so entangled and we would be totally dependent upon them. In this way they would exercise control over us and drain our money. In India such things are done by lawyers. They completely control individuals as well as societies by legal manipulation. Srila Prabhupada knew this although we were innocent.

Abhirama: There was talk about the significance of the centralization issue. What is the role of a GBC? And what is the role of a temple president? Prabhupada wanted a temple president to be autonomous. I don't think his position was supposed to be at the grace of the GBC. I think the only right the GBC had to remove someone was only in extreme cases, when there was a gross misappropriation of assets or misconduct. Later on temple presidents just became a rubber stamp and it's wrong. It's a very bad way to manage. From the study of management it's a very counterproductive system because we don't understand the principles of management, although Srila Prabhupada clearly understood. Tamal Krishna was the first person, besides Karandhar, that I felt really had some management abilities. He had a practical, let's get the job done, kind of attitude, which strikes my nature very well. This was an immediate impression. I believe that Srila Prabhupada was a strong pragmatist. Tamal Krishna Goswami had imbibed that from Prabhupada. He was practical on every point. I liked that because it was efficient. It meant using everything available, maximizing it for the service of Krishna. Jayatirtha and Ramesvara do not realize the danger of putting all ISKCON properties under one umbrella corporation. They think this will make management easier. To follow this issue to its conclusion, a few weeks later, Jayatirtha would fly to Dallas to try again to convince Prabhupada to incorporate ISKCON under the umbrella corporation. But Srila Prabhupada again refuses to give his sanction. Ultimately, when Srila Prabhupada would return to Los Angeles in June '75, the American GBC secretaries are called to discuss the umbrella corporation. It's becoming difficult for Prabhupada to assert his desire, so he requests the meeting with the GBCs to help him, because Jayatirtha and Ramesvara are so insistent.

The meeting is held in Prabhupada's quarters with the various GBC men sitting around him during his daily massage. Prabhupada requests Jayatirtha to explain everything. After hearing the explanation he's not satisfied, so Ramesvara and Jayatirtha continue presenting their arguments. Then Tamal Krishna speaks up. "Srila Prabhupada, what do you want?" "I do not want this. It is very dangerous." As soon as he says this, the other GBC men agree. "What's the question of doing it then? We won't do it." At this point Jayatirtha and Ramesvara are defeated in their attempt to push the idea through, and the idea becomes dead in ISKCON. After Srila Prabhupada's disappearance, however, the centralization issue again rears its ugly head pushed by several sannyasis and GBCs. But Prabhupada has already given his judgment in a letter to Karandhar who proposed the idea way back in December, 1972. His reply then was the same as always: "the Krishna Consciousness Movement is for training men to be independently thoughtful and competent in all types of departments of knowledge and action, not for making bureaucracy. I have heard from Jayatirtha you want to make a big plan for centralization of management, taxes, monies, corporate status, bookkeeping, credit, like that. I do not at all approve of such plan. Do not centralize anything. Each temple must remain independent and self-sufficient. That was my plan from the very beginning, why you are thinking otherwise? Once before you wanted to do something centralizing with your GBC meeting, and if I did not interfere the whole thing would have been killed. Do not think in this way of big corporation, big credits, centralization, these are all nonsense proposals. Only thing I wanted was that book printing and distribution should be centralized, therefore I appointed you and Bali Mardan to do it. Otherwise, management, everything, should be done locally by local men. Accounts must be kept, things must be in order and lawfully done, but that should be each temple's concern, not yours. Krishna Consciousness Movement is for training men to be independently thoughtful and competent in all types of departments of knowledge and action, not for making bureaucracy. Once there is bureaucracy the whole thing will be spoiled. There must be always individual striving and work and responsibility, competitive spirit, not that one shall dominate and distribute benefits to the others and they do nothing but beg from you and you provide. No. Never mind there may be botheration to register each centre, take tax certificate each, become separate corporations in each state. That will train men how to do these things, and they shall develop reliability and responsibility, that is the point." [Letter to Karandhar - December 22, 1972]