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During the 1980s and 1990s, there was a sequence of scandals in our movement, with devotees in high positions falling down in troublesome circumstances. This was, of course, an eye-opener that made us understand that it is not so easy for someone to become a pure devotee with just a few years of practice, as well as a warning about the consequences of electing unqualified people for positions of leadership in spiritual organizations.
What many may not know is that half a century earlier devotees in the Gauḍīya Maṭha suffered from a similar event, whose repercussions were even more serious. This is an event that is not very well known, but it can help us not only to better understand the reasons for the split of the Gauḍīya Maṭha but also to better understand many dangers we faced in the past and that can appear again in the future.
There is another reason this history is important. Many philosophical positions and misunderstandings that circulate today among Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavas are connected, directly or indirectly, with controversies that appeared during this period. What many consider “siddhanta” is nothing more than misconceptions introduced starting with this troubled period. Understanding what happened helps us understand why different branches that today all identify themselves as Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavas may have significant differences in philosophy and practice.
When the ācārya disappears
There is always a dangerous period after the disappearance of a powerful ācārya. While he is personally present, he can settle disputes, correct deviations, establish priorities, and keep different leaders cooperating under a common mission. After he leaves, all these responsibilities fall on his disciples.
In his purport to SB 4.28.48, for example, Prabhupāda mentions:
“The main business of human society is to think of the Supreme Personality of Godhead at all times, to become His devotees, to worship the Supreme Lord and to bow down before Him. The ācārya, the authorized representative of the Supreme Lord, establishes these principles, but when he disappears, things once again become disordered. The perfect disciples of the ācārya try to relieve the situation by sincerely following the instructions of the spiritual master.”
Who was Ananta Vāsudeva?
We then come to a figure central to the split of the Gauḍīya Maṭha after the disappearance of Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura. Many know details of the breakup of the Gauḍīya Maṭha, but this part is not so well known.
In a conversation from June 18, 1976, Śrila Prabhupada mentions:
“One of my Gauḍīya Maṭha Godbrothers, big, he became the head of this Bhag Bazaar Gauḍīya Maṭha. So his wife was debauched, and she was bringing new paramour, and the child protested. And the boy, he was ten years or twelve years old, he could understand: “Who is this man?” So he protested and said, “I shall tell all these things to my father.” And he was killed”... “His wife was a regular prostitute, and she killed her child, and on this shock, he took poison and died”... “He became shocked, that “This is my family life—the wife is prostitute and son is killed. What is the value of my life?” This was his spiritual realization. Just see. And he was made the chief.”
Here he is speaking about his godbrother Ananta Vasudeva, who was elected the acārya of the Gauḍīya Maṭha after the disappearance of Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura. Śrila Prabhupada apparently didn’t have a good opinion of him, since later in the same conversation he even accuses him of being “homosex and everything”.
In his poem entitled Viraha Astaka, composed in 1958, Śrila Prabhupada is even more direct when addressing his spiritual master:
“Your so-called disciple, the jackal named Ananta Vasudeva, disobeyed your final instructions to keep the mission united, and thereby created a scandalous fiasco. The result of this philosophical deviation is evident to this day as imitative sahajiyas are being worshiped as gurus in your temples.”
Śrila Prabhupada spoke some harsh words to some of his godbrothers in certain circumstances, reacting to some of their actions, but nowhere do we see him directing such direct personal attacks on any of them, especially on a deceased person. Who was Ananta Vasudeva, and what terrible thing did he do?
This story is described in a document entitled “The Sons of the Son: The Breakup of the Gaudiya Matha,” written by Jalakara Prabhu, a disciple of Śrila Prabhupada who collected a great volume of citations connected with these incidents. This is a document that can still be found online.
As described by him, Ananta Vasudeva was one of the most prominent disciples of Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura, who used to call him “My Ganesh” because he helped him so much in his writing and in other aspects of his preaching. He also had the opportunity of associating with Śrila Bhaktivinoda Thakura.
He had an extremely sharp intelligence and was described as being able to remember everything he heard. Often other disciples of Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura would ask him to explain lectures of their spiritual master that they could not understand, and Ananta Vasudeva could remember and properly explain them. Because of this gift, he became the chief editor for all the publications of the Gauḍīya Maṭha. From these descriptions, we can understand he was not an ordinary person. His downfall shows thus how even well-qualified devotees can fall later if they deviate from the path and start criticizing their spiritual master.
The Gauḍīya Maṭha started as a revolutionary movement, and the devotees were well respected for maintaining strong sadhana and living austere lives. However, as time passed, money and properties started to accumulate, and devotees started to fight over material facilities. At some point, there was a fight over which rooms each would use, something that Śrila Prabhupada also commented on occasion. In a famous lecture in Mayapur (October 6, 1974), he said:
“My Guru Mahārāja said. Personally he said that “When we were living in a rented house, if we could collect two hundred, three hundred rupees... We were living very nicely at Ultadanga. And since then—Jayavidatta has given us this marble palace, Gauḍīya-Maṭha—there is friction between our men. ‘Who will occupy this room? Who will occupy that room? Who will be proprietor of room?’ Everyone is planning in different way. So Guru Mahārāja said”... “He was personally instructing me that “If I could sell this marble of this temple, and secure some money, and if I could print some books, that would have been better. That would have been better.”
After Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura passed away in 1937, these conflicts came to the open. He had left instructions for the disciples to form a governing body to manage the mission (just like Śrila Prabhupada later implemented in our ISKCON society), but this proved difficult to implement, and as a result, most of the leaders in the Gauḍīya Maṭha went back to the idea of having a single acārya managing the mission. This resulted in devotees dividing into two factions, one smaller, supporting Kunjabihari Vidyabhusana Prabhu (who later became Tirtha Maharaja); and another larger, supporting Ananta Vasudeva (who later became Bhakti Prasad Puri Maharaja and eventually Puri Das).
There are plenty of different details connected to these disputes, but the result was that the Gauḍīya Maṭha split into two factions, centered around these two leaders. Eventually, Ananta Vasudeva was voted as the acārya of the Gauḍīya Maṭha by most of his godbrothers, leading to a decisive split between the two camps that started fighting over temples and other properties.
This led to the fratricidal legal disputes that drained the funds of the maṭhas and resulted in a serious volume of offenses being committed on both sides. This politicized environment also seriously affected the preaching and especially the publication of transcendental literature. At this point, even the press opened by Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura was sold to pay for legal expenses.
Śrila Prabhupada wrote his view on these events in his purport on CC Adi 12.8:
“In the beginning, during the presence of Oṁ Viṣṇupāda Paramahaṁsa Parivrājakācārya Aṣṭottara-śata Śrī Śrīmad Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura Prabhupāda, all the disciples worked in agreement; but just after his disappearance, they disagreed. One party strictly followed the instructions of Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura, but another group created their own concoction about executing his desires. Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura, at the time of his departure, requested all his disciples to form a governing body and conduct missionary activities cooperatively. He did not instruct a particular man to become the next ācārya. But just after his passing away, his leading secretaries made plans, without authority, to occupy the post of ācārya, and they split into two factions over who the next ācārya would be”... “Despite the spiritual master’s order to form a governing body and execute the missionary activities of the Gauḍīya Maṭha, the two unauthorized factions began litigation that is still going on after forty years with no decision.”
Apart from the legal disputes, there was another factor that caused a lot of confusion: the actions of Ananta Vasudeva, who gradually became critical towards Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura’s teachings and eventually left the sannyasa asrama, getting married to a society girl and becoming a babaji in Vrindavana. Jalakara Prabhu quotes the following:
“He insisted that all his disciples cease preaching activity and study the Bhakti Sandarbha. He especially criticized the use of texts like Gaudiya Kantha Hara, which give scriptural quotations for various philosophical positions, but which do not present the arguments. He and Sundarananda Vidyavinoda eventually came to the conclusion that Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati’s diksa was invalid, and he advised all his disciples to seek initiation elsewhere. Many of them did, and some became leading Vaisnavas in Vrindavan. Puri Maharaj [Ananta Vasudeva] sealed his infamy in Gauḍīya Maṭha circles by getting married and moving himself to Braja.”
The events connected with his marriage were also the source of a scandal. It is described in the document by Jalakara Prabhu that he had an affair with the sister-in-law of a rich devotee, who was later discovered because of the interception of a love letter. The scandal went on for several years, as Ananta Vasudeva (now as Bhakti Prasad Puri Maharaja) tried to maintain his post. This affair, which later led him to leave the sannyasa asrama and become a grihastha babaji (and later kill himself after discovering the betrayal of his wife), is confirmed by Śrila Prabhupada in the first quote.
The most serious problem, however, was not the sexual scandal but his rejection of Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura’s teachings. This is also quoted by Jalakara Prabhu:
“Now, every action has a gross cause and a subtle cause. One action is that he suffered a fall down from the brahmacari platform. The other is that he openly criticized and ultimately rejected his guru and rejected his initiation and line.”
“Ananta Vasudeva and his close friend Sundarananda Vidyavinoda began to formulate criticisms of their guru, Sri Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati. The were unhappy about the lack of siddha-pranali at initiation and felt that neither they nor their guru were linked to that vaishnava line by initiation, that the initiation as practiced by Sri Saraswati Thakur, both diksha and sannyasa, were invalid, eventually coming to the conclusion that only those born in certain families can be initiated, and can initiate. They also considered the wearing of saffron and Brahmin threads incorrect for those in the vaishnava line.”
“In this way they began an active program of scholarly criticism of Srila Bhaktisiddhanta’s philosophy, abandoning the literature of their guru and concentrating on the original works of the Six Goswamis. Ananta Vasudeva therefore eventually rejected the initiation given by Sri Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati, and urged his disciples to take diksha from what he called accredited acharyas, thereby rejecting his guru. This he justified on the basis of his understanding of the early writings of the followers of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. Sundarananda Vidyavinode wrote an essay on the subject entitled “The Characteristics of the Guru According to Vaishnava Theology.”
“Ananta Vasudeva and Sundarananda Vidyavinoda defected from his lineage and wrote books criticizing a number of Sri Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati’s policies several years after he left the world”… “all opposition to Bhaktisiddhanta also includes the fact that he did not receive siddha pranali from Bhaktivinoda or Gaura Kishora. Some critics go so far as to question whether he was initiated at all.”
“Ananta Vasudeva/Bhakti Prasad Puri Maharaja then went to Vrindavan, married one of his disciples - although it is not clear if that was to the sister-in-law of Sri Jagatbandhu dasa - and lived out his life in a reclusive manner, calling himself Puri dasa, writing a number of books. His criticism and rejection of Sri Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati has caused him to be viewed with repugnance by the Maths to this day. His supporters and defenders were left disillusioned.”
“Many of his former disciples became renounced residents of Radha Kund. Puri dasa (Ananta Vasudeva) had promulgated a style of kirtan known as ‘Sri Krishna Chaitanya Gaura Gunadhama’, and that kirtan can be heard there to this day, although it is interesting to note that Puri dasa eventually believed that congregational chanting of the Hare Krishna mahamantra was unauthorized.”
This succession of scandals led to the collapse of the camp led by him, although many of the sannyasis continued preaching by opening their own mathas. The smaller faction, left by Tirtha Maharaja (previously Kunjabihari Vidyabhusana Prabhu), was able to continue as a unified mission, although plagued by politics. When Śrila Prabhupada came to the United States, he wrote to Tirtha Maharaja offering to cooperate with him, but after receiving a discouraging letter, he proceeded to create his own organization in the form of our ISKCON society, counting exclusively on the help of his first disciples.
Ananta Vasudeva spent his remaining days living in Vrindavana, writing books with his interpretations of the writings of the Goswamis under the name “Puri Dasa.” These books were not accepted by most of his godbrothers, since they openly disagreed with the teachings of Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura. However, they became popular among other babajis and some scholars and devotees associated with them.
Nowadays these books are seeing a resurgence, as devotees from ISKCON and different Gauḍīya Maṭhas come to study them, assuming them to be authorized translations and commentaries of the works of the Goswamis, something they aren’t. One important point to keep in mind about translations is that translations, and especially commentaries of Sanskrit works, including works of our previous acāryas, are strongly susceptible to interpretation. No translation is free of interpretations, since it is practically impossible to keep the meaning of the text in a literal translation. When we read a “translation” of a Sanskrit work, we are thus actually reading an interpretation that conveys the beliefs of the author. A follower of Prabhupada will translate according to his conclusions; a Māyāvādī will translate according to his beliefs, while a babaji will translate according to his personal understanding. One should thus consider carefully not just the qualifications but the philosophical understanding of the author. In general, only Vaiṣnavas who have a very clear philosophical understanding can write bona fide translations and commentaries of anything. Members of different apasampradayas, as well as Māyāvādīs and ordinary scholars, will always distort the texts.
Once, a disciple of Śrila Prabhupada received an offer to exchange a collection of Śrila Prabhupada’s books for a set of the works of Ananta Vasudeva. Not knowing the whole story, he thought it was a good idea and accepted the exchange. When Śrila Prabhupada knew about it, he was very displeased and ordered him to immediately return the set books and get his books back. He didn’t want anything to do with them.
It’s also interesting to note that points raised by Ananta Vasudeva about siddha-pranali and other topics continue to echo today among devotees who go to Vrindavana and get in contact with this literature or who come in contact with it indirectly. As a result, a huge number of otherwise innocent ISKCON and Gauḍīya Maṭha devotees come in contact with these concepts and, due to an immature philosophical understanding, accept them without knowing they come from a line that is offensive to their own spiritual masters.
The fact is that there are lines in Vrindavana that are much older than the Gauḍīya Maṭha and have thus had time to establish their ideas through numerous books. Many of these books are well written from a scholarly viewpoint, but their conclusions are incorrect, as exposed by Śrila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura, and Śrila Prabhupada. The reason these five acaryas had to come and do their preaching was precisely to put the sankirtana movement back on track after centuries of deviations introduced by caste goswamis and self-taught babajis.
Many contemporaneous Vaiṣnavas now get in contact with such books, but the demise of Ananta Vasudeva, who after all his actions ended up killing himself after discovering that his wife was not only betraying him but had also killed their child, serves as an important eye-opener in this connection.
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Hare Krsna prabhu pranamas, thank you for this article. If I may ask, where is the place that Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati thakura Prabhupada mentions to form a governing body, as mentioned herein?