Humble Homage to His Divine Grace Srila Bhakti Pramode Puri Goswami Thakur.Dearest Srila Param Gurudeva – His Divine Grace Srila Bhakti Pramode Puri Goswami Thakur,Please accept my most humble dandavat pranams at Your lotus feet. All glories to You and All glories to our Guru Parampara!This year marks your 125th appearance anniversary. Though I am completely unqualified, on the merciful instructions of Srila Gurudeva – HDG Srila Bhakti Bibudha Bodhayan Goswami Maharaja, I would like to make this humble glorification to you. Please kindly accept this Srila Param Gurudeva!As Pramode Bhushan Chakravarti, you appeared on this planet in October 1898. From your youth, you exhibited traits and qualities that show that you are an exalted personality. While ordinary boys were playing with toys and kicking balls, you were associating with Srila Bhaktivnoda Thakura’s godbrother – Srila Bhaktiratna Thakura. Seeing your divine qualities, he showered you with much affection. He instructed you in devotional service and engaged you in the worship of his deities, Sri Sri Radha Madanamohana. Once, when you accidentally forgot to offer a blanket to Their Lordships before putting Them to rest, You started to feel extremely cold through the night. Due to this, you developed a fever. At the same time, Sri Sri Radha Madanamohana complained to Srila Bhaktiratna Thakura that They were feeling very cold. Early in the morning, you were instructed by Srila Bhaktiratna Thakura to take a cold bath and to place a blanket of Their Lordships. He instructed that when you do that, your ailments will also disappear.
You did as instructed and as soon as the blanket was offered to the Lord, your fever and cold disappeared! Though a young boy, you were already experiencing direct reciprocation from the Lord!In 1915 at the age of 13, on the inspiration of Srila Bhaktiratna Thakura, you went to Mayapur to see Bimala Prasad, who would later be your divine master – His Divine Grace Srila Prabhupada Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Goswami Thakura! At your initiation at the age of 23, you received 1stand 2nd initiation from Srila Prabhupada and received the name Pranavananda Brahmachari.After the disappearance of Srila Prabhupada, together with some of your godbrothers, you rented an apartment in Tollygunge, Calcutta, where you performed your bajan. One day, early in the morning, a widow appeared at the door asking for you by name. You were surprised as to how the widow would know your name, as you had never seen her before. She explained that she had Radha Krishna deities at home but was not worshipping Them. The night before, the deities appeared to her and asked her to give them to you, giving your name and address. The deities warned that if she did not do this, her whole family would be destroyed! You accepted Their Lordships and in honor of your mother’s Radha Gopinath deities, you named these deities Sri Sri Radha Gopinath. Many years later, you establish Sri Gopinath Gaudiya Math.Once, one of your disciples approached you saying that she had been diagnosed with cancer at its final stages.
She requested you for your blessings and asked if she could get some of the dust from your lotus feet. In response, you said rather than your feet dust, it is better to get the dust from the lotus feet of Krishna. You then instructed her, with details such as the time of the day, on how she could get the direct dust from the Lord’s lotus feet at different parts of Vraja. You then said that if Lord Krishna wants her to survive, He can cure her cancer. Your disciple did as you instructed, and her cancer was cured! Such is your divinity; while sitting in Mayapur or Calcutta, you were cognizant of the Lord’s pastimes and knew exactly how one could even get the dust from the Lord Himself.In the 1980s, perhaps for the first time, HH Radhanath Swami came to you to ask some questions. You were unwell and the doctors had advised you to not speak too much. Srila Radhanath Swami very humbly requested to hear some pastimes and glories of Srila Narottama Dasa Thakura. In response, you mentioned that you had forgotten many of the pastimes and that the doctors were giving you heavy medication. Radhanath Maharaja humbly persisted, and you started to speak. You went on for over an hour and spoke of pastimes from the scriptures. But amazingly, you also spoke of incidences that went beyond the scriptures. It seemed as if those different pastimes were appearing before you!Once, after taking Prasad, you requested that you wanted to continue writing and editing. As such, your dearest servant helped position you such that you could do your writing and editing work. As time passed, your dear servant fell asleep and was awakened by the sound of the temple bells at 4am the next morning. Immediately looking to see if you had taken any rest, he saw that you were still absorbed in writing and editing. He then reminded you that it was already 4am and that you should take some rest. In response, you mentioned that you had to chant Harinama, and accordingly continued your morning sadana.There are so many known pastimes to glorify you Srila Param Gurudeva and I am sure there are many more still unknown. Perhaps one day, some of these unknown pastimes will also be reveled to the world. Before I end this offering, for my purification and thepurification of the readers, I would like to share just one more pastime.During a hot summer afternoon, your pujari who was dressing Sri Sri Gaura Gadadhara in the Mayapur temple, hit Sri Gadadhara Pundit with his elbow. Immediately when this happened, you asked your temple manager to bring the pujari to you. When the pujari came to you, you gravely asked him why he did this and ordered him to beg for forgiveness. You told him that if he did not beg for forgiveness, he will get entangled into material life very soon!
After your pujari left the room, your temple manager asked you how you knew about this, as you were sitting in a separate room. In response, you said that Sri Gadadhara Pundit personally came and complained to you that the pujari hit Him and misbehaved with Him! Dearest Srila Param Gurudeva, I am so unfortunate that I never had the opportunity to have your darshan, to hear your words or to get your instructions. However, I feel fortunate to be Your grand disciple, through your dear servant, HDG Srila Bhakti Bibudha Bodhayan Goswami Maharaja. As the grandfather is usually more merciful to the grand child, on your divine 125th divine appearance day, I pray that you may be merciful to me, and bless me to serve Srila Gurudeva, to serve You and to serve our entire Guru Parampara favourably. Though I have many disqualifications, please kindly bless this fool so I may be of some value to you.As imparted to me by Srila Gurudeva, one desire I have in my heart is that all the sincere followers of Srila Prabhupada should come together in unity to spread this divine movement of Lord Chaitanya. If this is not done, Mahaprabhu’s movement will be likeany other sectarian religious movement on this planet, where everyone thinks they are the best. In this way over time, the entire movement may get lost. Srila Param Gurudeva, if you feel this to be a worthy desire that pleases you, kindly bless the innocent devotees within our Gaudiya Vaishnava community to discard any sectarian tendencies that may be present so we can truly serve the mission of Lord Chaitanya in unity!
With full of gratitude,Your lowly grand-disciple,Begging for the dust from your lotus feet, Vaikunthanath das