Dandavats,

reading this ghastly bit of news, I cannot but see the Lord's hand in this. It seems to me that Lord Jagannath has provoked these ignorant people into causing an intolerable offense to one of His dear devotees, just like He previously stirred up the dormant demonic nature of Kamsha by speaking to him.
By burning this effigy they have offended an entire community of devotees, thus by comitting this grave Vaisnava aparadha against Srila Bhaktivedanta Prabhupada, a pure devotee of the Lord, this group of ignorant priests has verily signed their own death sentence, paving their own road to hell.

A pure devotee of the Supreme Lord will not take offense to this, but it should be understood that it is the duty of the disciple of that pure devotee to take offense to this grave aparadha of burning an effigy of Srila Bhaktivedanta Prabhupada. This insult is basically a call to arms for any disciple of Prabhupada; actually for any Gaudiya Vaisnava. By this I don't mean we should become violent, but certainly some action has to be undertaken.

The example is given nicely in the life of Jiva Goswami, who felt offended when Sri Vallabhacarya corrected some of writings of Jiva Goswami's guru Srila Rupa Goswami, and thus rebuked and defeated Sri Vallabhacarya with sound arguments. As elucidated by Srila Bhaktivedanta Narayana Maharaj during a lecture:

Did Srila Jiva Gosvami do the right thing when he defeated the arguments of Sri Vallabhacarya and defended his Gurudeva?

[Devotees:] He was right.

[Srila Narayana Maharaja:] But what about his Gurudeva, Srila Rupa Gosvami? Was he right or wrong?

[Devotees:] He was right.

[Srila Narayana Maharaja:] How is that? If Srila Jiva Gosvami did the right thing, then Srila Rupa Gosvami must be wrong. How can Srila Rupa Gosvami be right?

[Devotee:] Because he is Guru, he has the qualification that he can correct…

[Srila Narayana Maharaja:] This is not a good argument.

[Devotee:] Srila Rupa Gosvami is Guru. He is:

trnad api sunicena
taror api sahisnuna
amanina manadena
kirtaniyah sada harih

["One can chant the holy name of the Lord in a humble state of mind, thinking himself lower than the straw in the street. One should be more tolerant than the tree, devoid of all sense of false prestige and ready to offer all respects to others. ln such a state of mind one can chant the holy name of the Lord constantly." (Sri Siksastaka 3)]

Srila Rupa Gosvami wants to respect everyone without desiring respect for himself. But Srila Jiva Gosvami could not tolerate that his Gurudeva was criticized.

[Srila Narayana Maharaja:] This is not the answer. This logic is not correct.

[Devotee:] Srila Rupa Gosvami sent Jiva Gosvami away because he wanted to increase Jiva Gosvami's love by making him feel separation.

[Srila Narayana Maharaja:] No. The answer is that Srila Rupa Gosvami wanted to respect Sri Vallabhacarya, but his disciple, Jiva Gosvami, disrespected him. This was wrong. Srila Rupa Gosvami considered, “Sri Vallabhacarya may think, ‘Rupa Gosvami is not openly disrespecting me, but he is disrespecting me through his disciple.’" Therefore, some blame might come to Rupa Gosvami. By punishing his disciple, Jiva Gosvami, Srila Rupa Gosvami was giving respect to Sri Vallabhacarya.

Actually, Srila Rupa Gosvami was right and Srila Jiva Gosvami was also right. A disciple should not tolerate anything against his Gurudeva. Thus, both the guru and disciple were right. Srila Rupa Gosvami wanted to respect Sri Vallabhacarya, and he did.