Суд над Бхагавад-гитой / Attempt to ban Bhagavad-gita

Entering Hell
I used to take only a piece of bread and one spoonful of sugar in the morning. The bread was of a very substandard quality. It was black and wet, and if you pressed it hard, water would drip out of it. So, I kept the bread on the window for three or four days until it was dried and crunchy, and then ate it. I learned how to make japa beads out of bread.

One morning, a guard used my beads to strike my face and body until he was exhausted. Those japa beads had been my only possession, for which I had saved so many pieces of bread. Soon we realized that even fifty-four beads were too risky to keep, so we started to make twenty-seven-bead strings. Being smaller, they were easier to hide from antagonistic persons. The difference was just that we had to chant four times in order to make 108, or one round. Sometimes, I even used a nine-bead set, keeping it almost all the time in my hand.

After a while, everyone in the jail knew about Krishna. Some people from the other cells started to ask me and the other devotees questions. Soon, offering food before eating became a tradition in our cell. Everyone in the jail was taking prasadam from the devotees. Even people who were against Krishna consciousness ate something out of our offerings. Many of the inmates told me that they could actually tell the difference between offered and non-offered food.

Who Is Crazy?
One day, we moved into a psychiatric hospital. I could not believe that the person in front of me was the same Sannyasa I knew before. He was so skinny! He moved slowly and slurred his speech. His chin had become sharp, and his eyes sunk in. His beautiful face, which had some beard growth, was very white. About one month before my coming, they started to give devotees daily injections by force of a neuro-psychological drug. Sometimes while he was talking, Sannyasa’s mouth would become dry and his eyes would roll like a drunk man. Sometimes he would sit and look at one spot for a long time without making a movement or saying anything. After a while, he would stand up and shake as if he were cold. Sannyasa is a very strong personality, and no matter what happened and in which condition he was in, he would every day complete chanting his sixteen rounds of the Hare Krishna maha-mantra—a determination that surprised me and inspired me with more energy to go on. After some time, they took us back to the jail to wait for trial.

Unwanted Days
In my new jail, the worst guard was a very rough, sweaty man. He shouted, “Today you will tell me exactly where you were printing your books and who was printing them for you. I know you did not tell it to anyone, but you will tell me today, only me. Do you understand that?”

He took his baton and beat me very severely on my forehead and temples. Then he hit me once with most probably his full energy. The blow sent me flying to the other end of the room, and I fell down with heavy bleeding from my nose and mouth. Then he came close to me and started to kick my back and chest so hard that I lost consciousness and do not remember anything whatsoever after that. I opened my eyes after some time and saw him dragging my body on the floor. He was cursing me and stepping on my stomach and face mercilessly. To protect my face, I turned. As soon as I had turned, he kicked my spine and I went unconscious again. Everything became black. My ears were blocked completely, and only some kind of a strange sound was constantly whistling in my ears. Then he threw me into my cell and closed the door with a curse.

The only lasting misfortune was my chronic spinal pain and eye problem. The lack of vision was a huge change in my life, and I had to get used to my new situation. I would have to go through life half-blind and almost disabled.

The devotees had paid three times the usual bribe at that time to send us a parcel full of wonderful prasadam. One prisoner was breaking up the bread when he found letters secretly hidden in it. They encouraged us to be strong, never forget Krishna, and continue to chant and follow the rules as much as possible in our difficult situation. Tears were running down my cheeks while reading their sincere sentiments, and my hands were shaking.

The Court Decision
After our trial, we were sent to Siberia to a labor camp where I spent the rest of my sentence.

Conclusion
After the registration of ISKCON, many conditions changed in the U.S.S.R. But that registration was not so easy to get. It was the result of countless demonstrations in front of many buildings and in various streets of Moscow. Generally, during these demonstrations there was some conflict with police and many devotees got arrested.

In 1989, for the first time in history, a group of fifty devotees were allowed by the Russian government to go to India for a pilgrimage. Most of them had been tortured by the KGB some months before. A two-month tour was organized. I was fortunate to be part of that historic pilgrimage. Just a year before, I was suffering in a jail, but now we were chanting and dancing with hundreds of devotees from all over the world.

ISKCON's Radha-Govinda Temple in Kolkata was the first real temple we had ever seen. There was a reception waiting for us, and thousands of flowers fell from the balcony on all the Soviet devotees. We slowly came up the stairs and entered the temple.

The moonlike faces of Radha and Govinda were smiling at all of us as if to say, “Finally you are home. There is no KGB here, so please chant and dance as much as you like.”