[Nectar] First anniversary ISKCON Ujjain Temple

[Guest guest]

By HH Bhakti Caru Swami

 

Transcription by Bhn. Rischma

 

The day after tomorrow, we are going to celebrate our first

anniversary of the inauguration of Ujjain temple. Last year, on

Nityananda Trayodasi, the inauguration took place. The date according

to English calendar was on 10th February, but this year the tithi

falls on the 31st January. So, according to the tithi we are

celebrating this festival.

 

One year went by, but it seems just the other day. It was last year, I

remember at this time, I was in such anxiety, because things were not

ready, the temple was not ready. And last few days were very, very

hectic. For example, even the day before the night before the

inauguration, the whole temple room looked like a battlefield. Like

the scaffoldings everywhere, the floor was strewn with all kinds of

things, the fall celing was not done. And the painting, the twenty

seven feet diameter painting, was yet to be put up. But everyone

worked, all the people who were taking care of different areas, they

actually had to work through the whole night, and by Krishna's mercy,

in the morning, everything was complete.

 

But one big job was to clean the temple, because it was...Actually, the

temple was a construction site. So after Mangala arotika, I made an

announcement, many devotees were there last year for the inauguration,

about 2.500 devotees came. After the Mangala arotika I made an

announcement, that those who wanted to clean the temple, they could

come. Practically all of them responded and we all marched into the

temple and we started cleaning. And from five thirty to seven o'clock,

within two hours, everything was cleaned and the temple was ready for

inauguration.

 

So it was a wonderful experience. Not only a wonderful experience, it

was an extremely memorable experience, at least for me and those who

were here at that time. Sometimes, I wonder how I managed to build

this temple in ten months time. The only thought that comes to my mind

is, or only realisation or awareness that comes to my mind is: it

happened by Krishna's mercy. And this actually proved, like how by...

how we sincerely, when you try to serve Krishna, Krishna actually

helps. And all kinds of wonderful things happen.

 

This year, it's lot more relaxed. Now the temple is built and

everything is going on nicely. People who come here, with great

admiration they admit that the temple atmosphere is so beautiful, the

Deity worship standard is so high, the sringara is so beautiful and on

top of everything, the Deities are so exquisitely beautiful!

Jananivasa prabhu, my godbrother, who had been the pujari in Mayapura,

the headpujari in Mayapura for last 35 years, Jananivasa prabhu was

here for the temple opening and he actually helped a lot. He helped a

lot in installing the Deities and in various ways he helped to set the

standard of Deity worship here.

 

Jananivasa prabhu was telling me that this Radharani of Radha Madana

Mohana, with Radha Madana Mohana, is the most beautiful Radharani in

the whole of ISKCON. He just said that this Radharani is more

beautiful than Radharani in Mayapura and in Vrindavana. And this is

the most beautiful Radharani. When Jananivasa prabhu says something

like that, it's really...because he doesn't say things just to flatter

somebody and especially when it comes to Radharani, he really meant

it.

 

Recently I heard, during his Vyasapuja, Radhanatha Maharaja mentioned

that the Ujjain project will become the most important project of

ISKCON. He said it's only a matter of time and Ujjain will become the

most vibrant and most important project of ISKCON. So I can see that

the devotees are feeling so positive and so optimistic, so hopeful

about this Ujjain project. And this naturally inspires me, enlivens me

and spurs me to really do something wonderful here.

 

Somehow Krishna brought me here. This is an important place. It's

Krishna Balarama's place of education and our mission is to educate

people. Krishna Consciousness movement is actually an educational

movement. It is teaching people how to become devotees of Krishna, by

understanding who Krishna is and how to develop our relationship with

Krishna, and by establishing that relationship with Krishna, how to

make our life successful. Sambandha, abhideya and prayojana is the

very basis of all our activities.

 

So, gradually I want to make this place into a place of education for

Krishna Consciousness. It is already happening. When people come here,

what they get to see? What I am mainly concerned about that whoever

comes here, they get a very good treatment and they get a very nice

impression of our movement. Actually, devotional service, although it

is focused on to devotion to Krishna, but its practical application is

through the devotion to the devotees of Krishna. It is by serving the

devotees we actually serve Krishna.

 

Krishna Consciousness needs to recognise the importance of the

devotees, the greatness of the devotees, the exalted position of the

devotees. Krishna says: "Those who think that they are My devotees,

they are not My devotees, but those who are My devotees' devotees,

they are My devotees." So devotional service is through devotees and

that's what I am trying to remind everybody here that: Serve the

devotees! Yes, you are serving the Supreme Personality of Godhead, but

the Supreme Personality of Godhead is manifest in this planet, amongst

us, in the form of His devotees.

 

So when we serve His devotees, He is served. When His devotees are

pleased, Krishna is pleased. First and foremost consideration is to

serve the devotees, make them happy. And this service for devotees

means respectful attitude towards the senior devotees, friendship

among the equals and affection and compassion towards the juniors. So

this is the first and foremost education that we all need. And then,

of course, there are other subsidiary branches of education also. Let

us see how far I succeed.

 

I would very much like to set up an international school here, where

children can come from all over the world and they can get educated

here. They will be groomed up to face the reality, face the world.

Although they will be getting the training to become devotees, at the

same time they will also have the practical education to deal with the

world.

 

Yesterday, we also had a very wonderful celebration of ground breaking

ceremony of a Food for Life building. So, the Madhya Pradesh

government has given us the assignment to cater to the Midday Meal

project, which is feeding 20.000 schoolchildren in this area. So for

that we are...we just started to build the kitchen. So it will be a

large kitchen, quite a large kitchen. It will be hundred feet long and

seventy five feet wide. So that way it will have seven thousand five

hundred square foot area.

 

And the kitchen will be equipped with all kinds of automatic machines

like, here people take chapati, so we have to serve chapati's to the

schoolchildren, and so we are getting a chapati machine, a chapati

making machine that will make ten thousand chapati's per hour. And

also puri making machine that will make ten thousand puri's per hour.

Plus we will have sixteen jackets which will prepare about three

hundred litres of subji in twenty minutes time. So in this way we are

preparing ourselves to cater to the need of feeding the 119 schools

around here within a 10 kilometre radius of Ujjain city. And we'll be

catering to 20.000 schoolchildren. So this is how we are also making a

headway to have some sort of connection to the schoolchildren in this

area. And eventually, we will set up our own schools.

 

Like, probably first thing that we'll do, which I am planning to start

this year only, that is the construction of primary school. That will

be kindergarten and primary school adjacent to our temple here. And

then eventually, we will set up this international school. I am

looking for a hundred acres of land to set up that school, because it

will be a first class residential school with all kinds of facilities

that the best schools in the world offer. And that's how we want to

bring them up.

 

We must bring up our children in the most wonderful way, in the best

possible way, because these people are going to become the leaders of

the world tomorrow. Therefore we have to bring them up, we have to

train them up in such a way, that they can become leaders, meaning

they can really guide the world when they grow up. They can really

guide the world to the real goal of life. And it is not just spiritual

prosperity, along with spiritual prosperity the material prosperity

also will come. Like Vedic India was the greatest nation, the greatest

country in the world at that time. It was the most opulent country, it

was the most powerful country. So Krishna Consciousness establishes

the most opulent, the most powerful, the most influential and the most

effective culture and that is how we have to bring up our children.

 

So, let us see how Krishna will guide us to achieving that. I am

simply depending upon His mercy. And in my own simple way, whatever I

can do, I am just trying to do. And things are happening, things are

happening. Like it's not that I just built this temple to sit down

here and have a nice time here. No. Rather, every day my

responsibility and my anxiety is increasing, because this is just the

beginning. This temple is just the beginning and we want to do so many

other things. And I know, as the responsibility increases, the anxiety

also will increase. But we have to take that anxiety for Krishna. That

is how this movement is going to grow. If we just want to eat and

sleep, then who will make this movement to spread all over the world

in every town and village? That is why we have to take up more and

more and more responsibilities and that is how Krishna will be pleased

and that is how Krishna will shower His mercy upon us.

 

So, day after tomorrow is the inauguration, the anniversary of the

inauguration. The first anniversary of the inauguration. Actually, we

came to Ujjain just two years back. And now we are celebrating our

first anniversary of the temple opening. This year, not so many

devotees will come, because on the same day is also the inauguration

of Tirupati temple. They have been building that temple for last

seven, eight years and it is going to be a very gorgeous temple. It is

a beautiful, marble temple. Revati Ramana prabhu, a disciple of

Jayapataka Maharaja, has been leading that project. He is a very

competent devotee and he has been behind this construction of the

temple for so many years. And finally the inauguration is taking

place.

 

This year, they are going to celebrate that on the Nityananda

Trayodasi. So our two programs are overlapping. Therefore, I won't be

able to go to Tirupati for the temple opening. Since many devotees

will be going there for the temple opening, not many senior devotees

will be able to come here this time. But we are going to have a big

program. Many devotees are still coming. Those who are close to Ujjain

project, also close to me, they are preferring to come here.

 

So the morning program will be just a spiritual program, the temple

program. The temple is going to be decorated with beautiful lightings

and beautiful flower decorations. And in the morning we'll have a fire

sacrifice and abhisekha of Sri Sri Radha Madana Mohana, Krishna

Balarama and Gaura Nitai. And then we will have prasada and this being

a very popular temple in the city, we're expecting many, many people

to come.

 

And then in the evening we will have a cultural program. This cultural

program is going to take place in a large park, not too far from the

temple. We are organizing the program in the park, because so many

people will come. We are expecting, we are making sitting arrangements

for about six thousand people. And the performance will be a dance

program by one Nandita Puri and her group from Bombay. And Anup

Jalota, who is a very famous singer, who actually has a title of

'Bhajana Samrata', the monarch of the bhajana, he will be coming also.

So we are looking forward to a very nice evening program, the day

after tomorrow. And that program probably will go on till midnight,

starting at seven in the evening.

 

So this is how we are going to celebrate. Many devotees have come.

Previously when devotees used to come, we used to put them up in

hotels, because we did not have our facilities here. But now our

guesthouse is opened. So all the guests are staying in the guesthouse

and they are very happy to be in the guesthouse, in the temple

premises. Those who haven't come here, I can just inform them that

this guesthouse is actually a very beautiful one. Probably the only

one of its kind, which is fully made of marble. No, it's another one,

which hasn't opened as yet, is the new guesthouse of Bombay, Juhu

temple. That is also made of white marble. But our guesthouse is made

of pure, white marble from Makrana. Not only our guesthouse, our

brahmachari ashrama also is made of pure, white marble from Makrana,

which produces the best marble in India.

 

And we also have developed a beautiful garden here. It's very

colourful, with so many varieties of flowers. Anyway, like whoever

comes, simply wants to appreciate it and express the desire that some

day they would like to come and settle down. Like today some devotees

from Italy, some householder devotee, he was telling me that how he is

planning to have a place here, so that he can spend his time here.

 

So the project is going on nicely and newer projects are also

developing. And I am happy that somehow we are able to do something

for Srila Prabhupada. Only, my only repentance, my only lamentation

is, that I couldn't do all these things when Srila Prabhupada was

present on the planet, because I would so much want to just walk up to

Srila Prabhupada and tell Srila Prabhupada that all that I am doing.

And what I would not give to see Srila Prabhupada just smiling with

appreciation for whatever little I am trying to do for him. But I hope

that from the spiritual sky Srila Prabhupada is watching me and Srila

Prabhupada is pleased with my endeavour to serve his lotus feet.

 

Srila Prabhupada ki Jaya! Jagad Guru Srila Prabhupada ki Jaya! Gaura

Premanande Hari Hari bol!

 

 

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