Om ajnana etc.

Srila Prabhupada appeared to help realize Lord Caitanya's prediction that the holy name would travel to every town and village and I believe that Tamal Krishna Maharaja also appeared to help Prabhupada in fulfilling the order of Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakur. Srila Prabhupada as we know came into the West all alone and then sincere devotees came forward. And Tamal Krishna Maharaja, from the beginning, took on a lot of responsibility to relieve Prabhupada of the headache of managing ISKCON. We heard all over about his job when he was the president of Los Angeles. I remember initially Prabhupada appointed two people to look after ISKCON's society's affairs, one on the west coast and one on the east coast.

And later on we saw how Prabhupada called upon Tamal Krishna Maharja to help establish the movement in England, Germany, Europe, and then when Srila Prabhupada came to India, India had so many problems, Prabhupada called Tamal Krishna Maharaja to India and gave him so many difficult assignments to do. As we heard and read, Prabhupada used to send him to the different temples in India to insruct that temples, leaders and about legal, preaching, other activities. We also heard how Prabhupada gave him this very dear task, that was the task of claiming this land in Mayapur, how Prabhupada was anxiously waiting for six days in Calcutta, and what was seemingly a very difficult situation was realized by Tamal Krishna
Maharaja's persistent efforts. And how he helped Prabhupada in overseeing the society in India, all over India.

Book distribution was very dear to Prabhupada. And we saw how when Tamal Krishna Maharaja went back to America he started the Radha Damodar party. He knew what was dear to Prabhupada and he started encouraging book distribution. And at one time the Radha Damodar party was distributing books that were equal to the whole society, the whole society was distributing as many books as the Radha Damodar party was distributing. So Prabhupada want book distribution and he sent Tamal Krishna Maharaja to America and he took this task very seriously.

So we all heard how Tamal Krishna Maharaja was very determined. I saw that myself, he was very determined, perfectionist. His real goal was to please Prabhupada and do what was best for ISKCON. And he also was very exemplary in his sadhana. He was very dedicated to Prabhupada's instructions, in fact if you read the Lilamrita, among all the devotees you'll find most reference is made to Tamal Krishna Maharaja because he was like Prabhupada's right hand. Prabhupada used to consult him, Prabhupada used to take his advice, and he was always ready to serve Prabhupada in any activity that was needed
to push on Krsna consciousness.

We also saw how during Prabhupada's last few months in this planet, how Tamal Krishna Maharaja was serving him. Very watchful about his health. When Prabhupada was not well he had a great desire to go to England and Tamal Krishna Maharaja made a lot of effort. And when Prabhupada reached England he told the devotees that I've come here due to Tamal Krishna Maharaja taking a risk and bringing me here due to his efforts. So he did do tremendous amounts of service to Srila Prabhupada, he was very very dear to Prabhupada and Tamal Krishna Maharaja he also left his body on a very very auspicious day, yesterday I understand was the disappearance day of Jagannath das Babaji, and in an auspicious location.

This reminds me of a talk that Prabhupada was giving on the appearance or disappearance day of his spiritual master and Prabhupada in that talk quoted the famous story of the sadhu who blesses different personalities. He blesses the king, the butcher and the saintly person and while blessing the saintly person the sadhu says "Live or die, makes no difference". So the same thing we can learn from Tamal Krishna Maharaja's life, his determination, dedication to Srila Prabhupada's movement, and we are sure that we are sure Tamal Krishna Maharaja is engaged in serving Prabhupada's
mission wherever Prabhupada desires. And we can all learn from his wonderful example and draw strength from his example as so that we can all make spiritual progress.

We also heard how Maharaja was having these kirtana sessions. I had a great fortune of hearing them also as I was his neighbour, and if we take advantage of Maharaja's instructions we'll all benefit and we'll all be able to make spiritual advancement. I personally had the opportunity to associate with him and I was very inspired and encouraged by his wonderful Vaisnava qualities and his determination to serve Prabhupada's movement.

Hare Krishna.

Tamal Krishna Maharaja ki! Jai!