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Prison Preaching around Vrindavan
From Sarvabhauma das
Posted May 28, 2004

My dear Prabhujis,

Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada!

For the last five months, we have been having weekly programs in the Mathura and Agra prisons, and monthly in the Tihar jail. Now the Tihar jail program will also be done weekly. A very sincere Brijbasi devotee named Janakinatha das has joined this program and is enthusiastically pushing it on.

Actually, we were busy with Ujjain Kumbha Mela for a month, and when we returned to the Agra Prison, the jailer Mr. Gupta, was complaining.

"We missed you for a month," he said. "Where have you been? The prisoners have been asking for you every day. We invited other groups to come, but all the prisoners complain, 'Why don't you call the Hare Krishna walas?' In your absence, the prisoners have been doing two hours of kirtan every day."

The superintendent also encouraged us. "Since you started these programs," he said, "the jail has become very peaceful. We don't have many fights, and they are doing their work enthusiastically. So please don't have big gaps. It's nice you went to Kumbha Mela, but don't neglect us."

Now we have a prisoner who is chanting 16 rounds. A few others are chanting 4 to 8 rounds. They asked us to bring them a mrdanga for their daily kirtans.

The next day, we went to the Mathura jail, and they showed us that in the ward they had nice pictures— one of Sri Sri Radha-Madhava from Mayapur and one of Srila Prabhupada. They were also keeping a copy of Srila Prabhupada's Bhagavad Gita. They were happy to join with us in kirtan. Then they did some Brijbasi bhajans, after which we distributed prasad. The superintendent told us that we should make a temple here in the jail.

"They are doing kirtan now every day," he said, "but we need a mridanga." So we will make arrangements for these things.

Then we went to Tihar jail in Delhi, where Srila Prabhupada had started prison preaching. This time we went to the juvenile jail, where the superintendent was also complaining that we had not come for a long time. Then he asked if we had any CDs of our prison programs, so they can send them to other jails in the country and interest them in this project. Then they can contact the nearest ISKCON temple for having programs in their jails.

Then we told them that we have decided to do this program weekly now and Delhi ISKCON will supply prasadam.

After our class, we distributed prasadam supplied by Food For Life from the Delhi temple. Then they took us to meet some of the inmates. I asked one young man why he was in jail.

"I snatched a mobile phone," he said.

"Why did you do that?" I asked.

"I come from a village," he said, "and I was doing some small key business. Then some people came and told me that their father needed a kidney transplant and if I would give a kidney, they would give me a lakh [100,000] of rupees. So they took me to their house and fed me very nicely for some days and got my test done in some hospital. Then one day we were going in the car, and the man said, 'I need a mobile. So you see that lady across the street? You go and snatch her mobile and come.' But when I snatched the mobile, the people caught me. The man who had instigated me fled away, and I was turned over to the police."

"After listening to you, I know that I have done wrong," he continued. "So now I will change my life and never do things like this again."

Another young man said that he had stabbed someone.

Why did you do that?" I asked.

"I was a pickpocket," he said. "Someone spotted me and was going to call the police, so I stabbed him. That was not good. Oh, no. I will never do that again."

So we are just distributing Srila Prabhupada's medicine for curing the criminal of his crime. The medicine is the chanting of the holy name, and in this way, following in Srila Prabhupada's footsteps, we are trying to develop this prison preaching program more and more. We want to start this program in Bharatpur jail also which is not far from Mathura.

Your servant,
Sarvabhauma das

© dipika.org May 28, 2004