Building a Temple -Story
(A Special Recipient of Srila Prabhupada’s Mercy from the speech of HH Giriraj Swami)
For Srila Prabhupada’s Vyasa-puja this year, I wish to tell you about his dear friend and staunch devotee Mr. P.L. Sethi. Much of what I shall narrate I experienced personally; the rest I heard from Mr. Sethi, except the description of his last days, which I heard from his family. May this story inspire you in Srila Prabhupada’s service—in Krsna consciousness.
When Srila Prabhupada first came to Bombay with his disciples from America, Mr. Sethi read a notice about them in the newspaper, which said that Srila Prabhupada had arrived with sadhus from foreign countries who chanted the Hare Krsna maha-mantra.
Mr. Sethi was part of a group that also chanted Hare Krsna, and so he wanted to meet Prabhupada, and he got the address and came to see him.
At their first meeting, Srila Prabhupada asked Mr. Sethi what he did during the day, starting from when he woke up in the morning.
Mr. Sethi began, “I get up, brush my teeth, take my bath, have a cup of tea and a piece of toast, read the newspaper, and go to work.”
Srila Prabhupada responded, “What is the difference between you and a pig?”
Mr. Sethi thought about it and seemed to agree: there was no difference.
So he asked Prabhupada, “What should I do?”
And Prabhupada replied, “You should invite the devotees to Goregaon [the northern suburb of Bombay where Mr. Sethi lived] early every Sunday morning to do hari-nama-sankirtana, and then you should feed them sumptuous prasada.”
And this became a regular practice.
Later, when Srila Prabhupada got the Juhu property, Mr. Sethi bought some land behind it and built a house for his family.
In India people often give names to their houses and office buildings, and he named his new home “Vrndavana.”
Srila Prabhupada underwent a great struggle to get the Juhu land and then to get the permissions to build on the land.
Mr. Sethi was a building contractor, and Srila Prabhupada engaged him in getting permits and doing some of the early construction.
At the back of the land were six two-storey apartment buildings, and before we got permission to build the temple and main project, Mr. Sethi got permission to add one storey on top of each of the buildings at the back.
The roofs of those old buildings were flat, with little white ceramic tile chips set in cement.
Srila Prabhupada said that we should keep that flooring and build the walls and roof over it.
When the first additional quarters were ready, Mr.Sethi took Srila Prabhupada on a tour.
Srila Prabhupada looked at Mr.Sethi with great affection and said:
“Just as you are building these rooms for my disciples here, Krsna is building your rooms for you in Vaikuntha, the spiritual world.”
But we still did not have permission to build the main project.
Finally, Mr. Sethi told Prabhupada, “Unless we pay them some money, we can’t get the permission.”
He wanted to know if Prabhupada was willing to do that.
Srila Prabhupada asked, “How much?”
Mr. Sethi said, “Five thousand rupees.”
Srila Prabhupada asked, “How do we know that if we pay the money we’ll get the permission?”
Mr. Sethi said, “The municipal commissioner is the final authority, and he seems to be a decent man, and this is how it works in Bombay.”
Srila Prabhupada said, “Let me think about it; I will tell you tomorrow morning.”
After Mr. Sethi left, Srila Prabhupada discussed the matter with me and maybe one or two other managers of the Juhu project.
“So, what should we do?” he asked. And he raised another question: “What if we give the money to Sethi and he doesn’t give it to the commissioner?”
He quoted a Bengali saying that a goldsmith, while fashioning some gold his mother gave him to make into a ring, is thinking, “Should I use all the gold for the ring or put some in my pocket?”
Prabhupada said that this type of cheating is so much a part of the goldsmith’s business that even if his own mother gives him gold to make an ornament, he will think, “Should I cheat and keep some of the gold for myself?”
Prabhupada said that the construction business—paying bribes and getting permits—is such that someone in it will automatically think, “Should I keep some of the money for myself?”—no matter whose money it is.
So there were many factors to consider—whether Mr. Sethi would give the money, or the full amount, to the commissioner, whether the commissioner, having taken the money, would in fact give the permission, or whether he might take the amount and then ask for more and more and more—so many complexities.
Finally Srila Prabhupada decided, “We will not do this.”
We were a little apprehensive about how Srila Prabhupada would present his decision to Mr. Sethi and how Mr. Sethi would take it.
And the next morning we waited anxiously for Mr. Sethi to arrive. Eventually he came and, as usual, sat on the floor before Srila Prabhupada.
“So, what do you think?” Prabhupada asked.
“Should we do it?” Mr. Sethi replied,
“Yes, because otherwise we are not getting the permission.”
Prabhupada immediately said, “All right”—just the opposite of the way the discussion had been going the day before.
So Prabhupada arranged the money, and we got the permission.
Srila Prabhupada, as the acarya, was teaching us. He often told us that intelligence means to see the same thing from many points of view and that we should do everything very cautiously and carefully. I do not believe that he actually doubted his
dear friend and staunch devotee Mr. Sethi, but he was teaching us to be circumspect and consider every proposal with keen intelligence.
In the course of the struggle, the municipality had demolished the semi-permanent temple we had built for Radha-Rasabihari.
At first, we actively campaigned to get permission to rebuild it. But eventually we concluded that we didn’t really need a permit to rebuild it, because we already had permission and the municipality didn’t actually have valid grounds for demolishing it. Still, the landlady, Mrs. Nair, somehow heard about our intention and went to the court
to get an injunction to stop us from rebuilding the temple.
That was on a Friday, and the judge said he would not give the injunction without hearing us.
She said, “Just give a temporary injunction for the weekend and then you can decide on the permanent injunction.”
But he said, “No, without hearing the other side I will not pass any judgment.”
So we knew we had the weekend to rebuild the temple, because once it was rebuilt, the injunction would be meaningless.
In those days it was difficult to get cement, and a little hard to get bricks. The supply was less than the demand. And the government has imposed “cement control”:
To purchase cement legally, one had to procure a government-approved quota.
But Mr. Sethi brought cement and bricks from his own construction sites, so we could rebuild the temple over the weekend.
While the work was going on, Mr. Mhatre, the local municipal counselor, who was in cahoots with Mrs.Nair, came to the site and demanded, “You stop the construction immediately.”
Mr. Sethi replied, “No. Why should we stop?”
Mr. Mhatre threatened, “Well, you can build it up, but I will come in the night with fifty gundas [hooligans] and break it down.”
And Mr. Sethi turned to his son, who was by his side, and said, “Brij Mohan, bring my revolver and my rifle.”
Then Mr. Sethi said to Mhatre, “Don’t bring fifty gundas. Bring a hundred. Bring two hundred. I have two hundred and fifty cartridges.”
He was that staunch. Then he and his son—he with rifle in hand, his son with revolver—stayed up all night, in the pouring rain, to complete and protect the project.
And no one came to disturb the work.
On Monday morning we appeared in court and told the judge that the temple had already been rebuilt.
And the judge said to Mrs. Nair, “What is built is built. No one can destroy the temple.”
Eventually we did get permission to build the main complex.
(PATIENCE PAYS -STORY! READ HERE!)