Dear Śrīla Prabhupāda,
Please accept our humble obeisances at your divine lotus feet.
This year we are celebrating your 129th appearance anniversary. Because of your purity and
determination, the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement has spread to every corner of the world. In the
purport to Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Ādi-līlā 7.164 you stated, “The Gosvāmīs not only engaged in writ-
ing books but also constructed temples, because both are needed for preaching work.” You wrote
that both the distribution of books and the construction of temples should continue side by side,
on parallel lines.
In the next few days, on the auspicious occasion of Rāma-navamī, we will be celebrating the
twenty-seventh anniversary of your ISKCON Delhi, and the fifty-second anniversary of Śrī Śrī
Rādhā-Pārtha-sārathi. It will also be marking the first anniversary brahmotsava of the last ever
temple inaugurated by your dear spiritual son, His Holiness Gopal Krishna Goswami Mahārāja,
at Rohini, New Delhi.
Śrīla Prabhupāda, you spent considerable time in Delhi. Residing at the Rādhā-Dāmodara
temple in Vrindavan, you regularly traveled to Delhi to get your books published and to distrib-
ute them. As you did not have enough funds, you would travel from Mathurā to Delhi in a third-
class compartment. After establishing ISKCON in the West, you returned to India to preach to
the Indians who had forgotten their Vedic culture. Your vision of Delhi focused on the fact that
Delhi was the most important city in Asia. According to Tejas Prabhu, who was president of the
Delhi temple until 1976, “Śrīla Prabhupāda wanted to do programs every week in different parts
of Delhi. Prabhupāda kept increasing his desire to have temples in Delhi from eight to eighteen
centers! He wanted influential people to be invited to these programs.”
Śrīla Prabhupāda, due to your causeless mercy, we have almost achieved the target you gave
us. During the 1975–77 period, His Holiness Gopal Krishna Goswami Mahārāja went with you to
many locations to obtain land for temples. After a long struggle, we obtained a very significant
piece of land in South Delhi. Śrī Śrī Rādhā-Pārtha-sārathi were first installed by you at Ananda
Niketan, in a rented facility. Later, They were moved to another rented house in Bengali Market.
Finally, a beautiful temple was built for the pleasure of Their Lordships Śrī Śrī Rādhā-Pārtha-
sārathi, Śrī Śrī Gaura-Nitāi, and Śrī Śrī Sītā-Rāma-Lakṣmaṇa-Hanumān. This project was inaugu-
rated on Rāma-navamī 1998 by the late Prime Minister Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who praised you
and your movement.
Then we obtained a second temple in Punjabi Bagh. This temple has also attracted thousands
to Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Gradually, your movement went on expanding, and ten temples were
opened in different locations. Currently we have six major temples under construction.
Presently, we have temples under construction at Kurukshetra, Dwarka, Ghaziabad, and two
other locations. By your causeless mercy and the inspirational leadership of His Holiness Gopal
Krishna Goswami, devotees of Delhi NCR achieved the target you gave – that of constructing
temples in New Delhi, gradually, growing from eight to eighteen!
Often, devotees are amazed by the number of temples we have in Delhi. All this has become
possible only due to your purity and the tapasya you performed in this city. This tapasya was fur-
ther developed by the labor of love undertaken by His Holiness Gopal Krishna Goswami.
By your mercy, the devotees of ISKCON Delhi distributed more than 6.74 lacs mahā big books
throughout the year, standing second in the world in book distribution and also during the book
marathon!
Nearly fifty new bhaktas joined us as resident devotees. They distributed 56,000 mahā big
books, including 125 Bhāgavatam sets and Caitanya-caritāmṛta sets on the road during your Decem-
ber book marathon. We are so inspired by these results that we have called our new bhakta pro-
gram at ISKCON Delhi the saṅkīrtana devotee training program!
We have now started active college preaching programs across Delhi, including regular pro-
grams at three of the premier global institutions: Delhi School of Economics, AIIMS, and IIT,
besides many of the nationally acclaimed colleges from Delhi University.
In Delhi University’s famed Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium/Auditorium, nearly eight thousand
students took a pledge not to use drugs and other intoxicants before several luminaries in the
Udgaar Youth Festival, organized by the enthusiastic preachers of the ISKCON Youth Forum.
Every single festival at ISKCON Delhi was attended by a packed temple hall, auditorium, or
pandal, as the case may be.
Your communications team commendably ensured that the ambassadors of eight Latin Ameri-
can nations visited the temple together, and each of them went back, inspired by the grandeur
and purity of your ISKCON Delhi!
We are merely reaping the fruits of the seeds planted by you.
The much-lamented departure of the light of our lives and the life and soul of ISKCON’s activ-
ities in Delhi NCR, His Holiness Gopal Krishna Goswami, on May 5th, 2024, has made us more
responsible, united, and committed in your service, Śrīla Prabhupāda. Under the able leadership
of His Holiness Guru Prasad Mahārāja, the entire team has ensured that we persist in “doing the
needful.”
The entire ISKCON Delhi is a memorial for His Holiness Gopal Krishna Goswami Mahārāja
and his service to your divine lotus feet. He once remarked, “Don’t try to please me; try to please
Prabhupāda.”
In his last will he instructed us to work together under ISKCON’s ultimate managing
authority, the GBC, in the shelter of senior Vaiṣṇavas, and the entire yātrā – the more than eight-
thousand-strong congregation, the thousands of youths, the hundreds of social luminaries who
are well-wishers, the scores of brahmacārīs, and everyone else connected to this yātrā, seek your
blessings on this 129th Vyāsa-pūjā of Your Divine Grace. On this auspicious day we each beg you
for your mercy that we may continue to serve you with even more surrender and with complete
cooperation, organization, and intelligence.
Your Servants at ISKCON New Delhi, East of Kailash

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