Controversy On Ekadasi Calendar

suchandra · 02-15-2008, 04:36 AM

Since Gaudiya-Vaishnavas are ordered by Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu to observe the vow of honouring Ekadasi, surely a topic of import.

Controversy on Vaisnava Calendar

BY: SHYAMASUNDARA DASA
Feb 13, USA (SUN) — Dear Urmila Mataji, Please accept my humble obeisance. All glories to Srila Prabhupada. Bhakti-vighna-vinasa Narasimhadeva Bhagavan ki jaya!
Like you, others often ask me questions about the Vaisnava Calendar because I am the author of the VCAL program that was used in ISKCON since 1984 and am thus considered an authority on the subject.
However, I resigned from the Vaisnava Calendar committee as a protest to what in my opinion was obvious incompetence and ignorance on the part of the committee chairman that endangered the accuracy of the calendar, in particular the calculation of Ekadasi. Attached is a zip file [document follows] that explains the reasons why I resigned and the aftermath that followed.
Since everyone in ISKCON depends on VCAL it should be a topic of interest. Pass it on to others who are interested. If however, you are not interested in the Vaisnava Calendar then just hit "delete."
Your humble servant,
Shyamasundara Dasa
P.S. I had prepared this text some time ago but the car accident I was in delayed its publication till now.

Dear reader,
Please accept my humble obeisance. All glories to Srila Prabhupada. Bhakti-vighna-vinasa Narasimhadeva Bhagavan ki jaya!
For those of you who are not familiar with hypertext the following documents are organized in two sections to allow for best comprehension. The first is a three page document which succinctly explains the situation. It contains hypertext links to evidence supporting the assertions made there in. The second much larger portions contain the evidence linked to in the first portion.
You should first right-click on the tool bar area of MS Word, many options will appear, turn on the “web” option this will allow you to navigate the document back and forth like a webpage.
I suggest that after you click on a link that you return to the main document after you read the linked text so that you will be able to follow the flow of the narrative. Alternatively you could read the first three pages without clicking any links and then return to the beginning and read again this time clicking on any links of interest.
Your humble servant
Shyamasundara Dasa

Controversy in the Vaisnava Calendar Committee

“That Brahmana, who is dishonest and falsely gentle, with downcast look, of a cruel disposition, is solely intent on attaining his own ends, is one who acts like a Baka (heron).” Manu Samhita 4.196.

Dear Maharajas, Prabhus and Matajis;
Please accept my humble obeisance. All glories to Srila Prabhupada. Bhakti-vighna-vinasa Narasimhadeva Bhagavan ki jaya!
Because I am the author and legal copyright holder of VCAL my name is intimately associated with the Vaisnava Calendar. And, furthermore I get many inquiries about the workings of the Vedic Calendar as I am considered an authority on the subject as the following letter illustrates:
From: Shyamakrishna (das) RNS (Vrindavan - IN)
Date: 10-Jul-07 04:05 -0400
To: dgmspn2@gmail.com (sent: 10-Jul-07 04:07 -0400)
Cc: Shyamasundara (das) ACBSP (Vedic Astrologer) (USA) [35297]
Comment: Text PAMHO:13827156 by Shyamasundara (das) ACBSP (Vedic Astrologer)
(USA)
Subject: Re: EKADASI
------------------------------------------------------------
I have forwarded your mail to an AUTHORITY on this subject. WE can await his
reply in couple of days.

Ekadasi feast, fruit salad, Krsna Balaram Mandir

However, I have withdrawn from the Vaishnava Calendar Committee primarily because the GBC has put a dishonest (see here as well), non-expert, bureaucrat, Bhaktarupa Prabhu, as head of the committee. His involvement, past and present, as this text explains, has given me a lot of pain.

This document explains the controversies leading to my resignation from the Vaisnava Calendar Committee despite the fact that I designed and authored the VCAL program; and, Bhaktarupa’s attempt to cheat me of my copyright.

A Brief History of the VCAL Program

First a brief history of the VCAL program. This text will bring you up to speed on many of the issues involved. It was my publication of this history to the GBC Deputies in 2006 that forced the calendar committee (after I had already resigned from it) to press the issue and as a result it was found that my stance against variable muhurta was correct all along and that Markendeya Rsi’s research was highly flawed. Read HH Bhanu Svami’s letter which vindicates what I have been saying for years.

VCAL Copyright issues

In this section we document how Bhaktarupa Prabhu has over the years covertly tried to usurp the VCAL copyright from me by approaching the BBT without my knowledge. The BBT however could understand that something was amiss and stated the following:

“The BBT directors have discussed the VCAL copyright issue, and the conclusion was to officially request you [Bhaktarupa dasa] to kindly remove the BBT from the copyright notice.

I wish to add that it is my personal understanding that this will mean that
Shyamasundara Prabhu will, in turn, be put on the copyright notice.”

Letter from BBT to Bhaktarupa Prabhu February 9, 2006

What had brought this whole issue to a head in late 2005 to mid 2006 was that Bhaktarupa Prabhu would not recognize me as the legal copyright holder of VCAL because he wanted to use my algorithms (translated to a different language) in a different program and I would not give him permission to use them. I did this because when I politely brought up my concerns to him he ignored me. I knew he had no knowledge of jyotish and would never be able to figure it out himself and this would become a stumbling block and force him to correct the grievous error that he was responsible for allowing to enter VCAL (he did it out of gross ignorance not out of malice) I assumed that he was an honest man and would honor what everyone else recognized, but I was wrong.

Instead of dealing with me in an honest way Bhaktarupa Prabhu used duplicitous tactics. As soon as I resigned from the Calendar committee on January 28, 2005 Bhaktarupa Prabhu again tried to steal the copyright. He never responded to my resignation letter but instead he immediately went behind my back to the BBT as is evidenced by this letter from a BBT trustee; which shows that at the insistence of Bhaktarupa Prabhu the BBT in April 2005 (3 months after my resignation) assigned whatever “rights” they had in VCAL to the GBC whom Bhaktarupa Prabhu said he was representing. In this way he hoped to take my copyright to VCAL away from me.

This letter of June 20, 2006 indicates how Bhaktarupa Prabhu has for years tried to usurp the copyright of VCAL from me by going behind my back (never once coming to me directly) and getting the BBT to give it to him pretending that he represented the GBC. But when he is put on the spot he denies he represents the GBC. He hints why he wants the copyright because he has no knowledge of the subject and hence wants to steal my intellectual property instead of doing the hard work that I did to create VCAL.

After a lot of back and forth in which Bhaktarupa Prabhu tried in every possible way to justify his theft of my intellectual property the BBT representative had had enough and wrote thusly:

“I think that this has gone way beyond micro hair-splitting, and has entered
some twilight zone realm of either plain, outright dishonesty on your part, or, Krishna forbid, possibly some form of mental disturbance or worse on your part. If the latter, then just know that you are loved as a brother, Prabhu, and everyone is genuinely concerned for your well-being.”

Letter from BBT representative to Bhaktarupa July 6, 2006

After this Bhaktarupa resorts to more word jugglery exposing his blatant dishonesty.

suchandra · 02-15-2008, 04:37 AM

From a direct reading of Bhaktarupa’s many texts he appears to be very humble and meek yet he is persistent and passively aggressive in achieving his goals by adharma.

“That Brahmana, who is dishonest and falsely gentle, with downcast look, of a cruel disposition, is solely intent on attaining his own ends, is one who acts like a Baka (heron).” Manu Samhita 4.196.

Bhanu Svami asks if the rights have been transferred. The BBT provides proof but also states that “BBTI does not guarantee that it holds any rights in the Vcal software.” Because they know I hold the rights but they were pushed into doing this by Bhaktarupa.

Other devotees also observe Bhaktarupa’s behavior and concur that I own the copyright. But Bhaktarupa persists in his dishonesty to everyone’s frustration.

This sums up the situation as of now. Because the GBC, for God knows what reason, keeps a person of Bhaktarupa Prabhu’s character as the head of the Vaisnava Calendar Committee I will not work with that committee.

It may interest those who are concerned about the future of ISKCON that a person like Bhaktarupa Prabhu holds several very responsible positions in ISKCON including: Chairman of Indian Continental Committee, Vice chairman Indian RGB, as well as being a very influential member of the GBC deputies with great influence in determining what issues the GBC deals with at its annual meeting in Mayapura.

Your humble servant

Shyamasundara Dasa
www.ShyamasundaraDasa.com

PS: Muhurta debate

For those of you who want more gory details of the kind of technical wrangling that went on for months in the Calendar Committee I have collated a sample of some of the exchanges in the debate between Markendeya Rsi Prabhu and myself along with some of Bhaktarupa’s comments. Note how Bhaktarupa Prabhu who is chair of the committee is unable to evaluate the merits of arguments - yet he is in charge. These texts should be read knowing that Markendeya Rsi based his arguments on what turned out to be incorrect research. Despite these revelations he never admitted to me that he was wrong.
A Brief History of the Vaisnava Calendar Program

This text was sent to the GBC Deputies in Mayapura.

Letter PAMHO:11133275 (232 lines) [W0]
From: Shyamasundara (das) ACBSP (Vedic Astrologer) (USA)
Date: 15-Feb-06 20:38 -0500
To: Svavasa (das) ACBSP (NA-BBT) [18819] (received: 16-Feb-06 07:58
-0500)
Cc: Vedavyasapriya Swami (ACBSP) (Vrindavan - IN) [6837] (received:
15-Feb-06 22:52 -0500)
Cc: Hari Sauri (das) ACBSP [52287] (received: 17-Feb-06 16:30 -0500)
Cc: Jagajivan das ACBSP (Asuncion - Paraguay) [2722] (received:
17-Feb-06 04:13 -0500)
Cc: Krsnadasa Kaviraja (das) ACBSP (Toronto - CA) [884] (received:
16-Feb-06 23:05 -0500)
Cc: Aniruddha (das) BJD (Melbourne - AU) [28345] (received: 17-Feb-06
20:15 -0500)
Cc: Braja Bihari (das) BJD (Vrindavana - IN) [132068] (received:
17-Feb-06 10:13 -0500)
Cc: Devakinandan (das) JUHU (Bombay - IN) [13905] (received: 16-Feb-06
05:28 -0500)
Cc: "GKD"
Cc: Hari (das) KDS (Coventry - UK) [4696] (received: 21-Feb-06 02:57
-0500)
Cc: Rasaraja (das) BI-Bombay-Berkeley (TP Berkeley) [2862] (received:
17-Feb-06 18:56 -0500)
Cc: Sarvaisvarya (das) JPS (Coimbatore - IN) [36480] (received:
16-Feb-06 09:10 -0500)
Comment: Text PAMHO:11151076 by Internet: "Jagadisananda (Dasa) ACBSP (BBT
Los Angeles - USA)"
Subject: A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE VAISNAVA CALENDAR PRORGAM - VCAL
------------------------------------------------------------
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE VAISNAVA CALENDAR PRORGAM - VCAL

by Shyamasundara Dasa

In 1982 before the Mayapura meeting HH Jayapataka Swami cornered me in his
quarters and very persuasively convinced me against my will to
write a program for generating the Vaisnava calendar. Please note that he
had to use such tactics because I had no interest in doing this
project, to me it was (and still is) a distraction from my on going in-depth
study of Jyotish. But, he countered, that it was precisely because I had
such in-depth knowledge of the subject that I was the only one qualified to
do the work and that it was traditional for a Jyotisa to also make
pancanga's. After I very reluctantly agreed I added that I would do it with
the proviso that Bhanu Swami help me with translation of important
documents. He agreed. A resolution was thus passed by the GBC at the 1982
meetings that with the aid of HH Bhanu Swami I would take up the project of
what eventually became VCAL and that HH Mukunda Goswami would publish the
results in the ISKCON World review. I was also told that Mukunda Goswami
would provide needed funding for the project. That year it was also resolved
that Prabhupada Krpa Goswami aka Hari Sauri Prabhu be the GBC overseeing
Jyotish - he was my GBC.

In 1983 I moved back to the West and was settled in New Vrndavana. I decided
this was the time to seriously take up the duty I had promised to do the
previous year. But when I approached Mukunda Goswami for the funds he flatly
refused to give me any money saying he knew nothing about it. Eventually I
borrowed the money ($2400) from my family and bought a computer from Adi
Keshava x-Swami. It was an Osborne Executive, the first portable computer;
it had 128 K (not M) of RAM, 2 floppy drives that could each hold 360K of
data and no hard drive. It ran the C/PM OS it was not IBM compatible -
remember this is 1983. (In 1988, after hearing that I had paid for the
computer by borrowing the money Harikesha x-Swami, embarrassed on behalf of
the GBC, repaid me the money but demanded that I give him the hardware. He
changed his mind on realizing the hardware was obsolete and incompatible.)

Though I was supposedly fulfilling my obligation to the GBC by doing this
program (at my own expense mind you) the local GBC Kirtanananda Swami was
very uncooperative and could not care less. I was required to do full time
service at NV as pujari and giving tours at the Palace of Gold and then if I
had spare time I could work on fulfilling my obligations to the GBC.
Considering the lack of any kind of cooperation I was getting from ISKCON to
do a project I didn't even want to do for them but now felt obligated
because I had promised to do I now wonder how and why I did it. I did it as
an offering to Srila Prabhupada and his sincere followers that is the only
explanation.

Rising every morning at 2 AM I worked on the project from about August 1983
and completed it around February 1984 just in time to give a printout of the
next 5 years of the Vaisnava Calendar to Hari Sauri Prabhu who was visiting
NV on GBC business. It was the first time we had such a document before
Gaura Purnima because previously we had to wait for the Gaudiya Math to
publish their yearly calendar.

In 1984 Harikesha x-Swami wrote me and requested me to sell him a copy of
the VCAL source code for $350.00. I needed money to repay what I had
borrowed so I agreed. This was my first mistake - I let the source code
which I had so painstakingly created out of my hands and gave it to people
who were clueless. HKxS's idea was that he would get his computer mavens to
convert it so that it could run on the elaborate computer system they had in
Korsnas Gard and then publish the results and distribute to temples in
ISKCON. Sometime later I was contacted by HKxS who was very keen on having
ISKCON use VCAL for a number of obvious reasons. The problem it seems was
that somehow his versions of VCAL that I had sold him had become corrupted.
What happened was that while his computer mavens were infinitely better
programmers than I they had little or no concept of Jyotish and as such had
- in their efforts to improve the program - introduced innumerable bugs.
Finally in August 1988 I flew to Sweden to figure out how to clean up the
mess. That is when I met Markendeya Rishi Prabhu. The idea was that under my
strict guidance Markendeya Rishi would repair the problems created by others
and also following my instructions would improve the program considering
that I had originally created it on a primitive machine and technology had
improved a lot since then.

Since HKxS wanted VCAL to be re-implemented in ISKCON (for various reasons
it was temporarily abandoned around 1986) it was decided that we needed to
do some research with traditional pandits in India and make a presentation
to the GBC. Since I could not go personally I made up a list of questions to
ask the panditas and Markendeya Rishi went on my behalf. Then based on those
results he made up a report to the GBC. It should be noted that whatever
Markendeya Rishi learned about the calendar he learned from me and was
basically my servant. He knew nothing of astrology/astronomy but was a
programmer.

suchandra · 02-15-2008, 04:38 AM

---------- Forwarded Message ----------

Text PAMHO:8159240 (94 lines)
From: Shyamasundara (das) ACBSP (Vedic Astrologer) (USA)
Date: 05-May-04 13:54 -0400
To: "Magnus Andersson"
To: Calendar Research
Reference: Text PAMHO:8153942 by Internet: Magnus Andersson
Comment: Text PAMHO:8161120 by Bhaktarupa (das) ACBSP (Bhubaneswara - IN)
Subject: Muhurta
------------------------------------------------------------
> > > AND: Shyamasundara Prabhu wanted to discuss changing back to the fixed
> > > muhurta system.
> >
> > This is a definite must. Muhurta is a fixed length of time just like a
> > minute is a fixed lenth of time. We do not make our minutes longer in
> > northern latitudes and shorter in southern latitudes. Or in summer or
> > winter.
> >
> > A Muhurta is 2 Nadikas, aka Danda aka Ghatika. The duration of a Ghatika
> > is 24 minutes and was derived (as described in Bhagavatam) by the use of
> > a cylpsedra--a water clock. It can not be stretched or shrunk.
>
> A minute might be defined as a fixed length of time, yes, but is a muhurta
> defined like that?

Yes it is. It is 1 Muhurta= 2 ghatikas. 60 Ghatikas = 24 hours.
1 Ghatika = 24 minutes = 60 Pala, 1 Pala= 24 seconds. 1 Pala = 60 Vipalas,
1 Vipala = 60 Prativipalas.

On Ekadasi only bananas are distributed, source: http://www.vaisnava.cz/clanek_en.php3?no=192

>
> For example, day and night are generally not defined as a fixed length of
> time. Day and night are generally defined as the amount of time between
> sunrise and sunset, and sunset and sunrise, respectively. Maybe muhurta is
> also following that kind of logic. If so, then a variable length makes
> sense.
>
> The fact that it is mentioned that the length of a muhurta kan be measured
> by a clock (a water clock or any other device) does not necessarily mean
> that it is defined as fixed, it might just be a practical way to determine
> the length for countries located close to the equator, where the lengths
> of night and day don't
> vary so much.
>
> Having a fixed length muhurta gives us a variable number of muhurtas in a
> day (even fractions of muhurtas.)
>
> Having a variable length muhurta gives us a fixed number of muhutras in a
> day, namely 15 (and 15 in the night.)
>
> So, what is it that is fixed? The length of them or the number of them?

full article

Jahnava Nitai Das · 02-15-2008, 07:00 AM

The problem here is a westerner, Bhaktarupa Das, without having properly studied jyotisha, has created a new bizarre system of setting the lengths for the divisions of the day (muhurtas). No astrologer in India follows this made up system, so why make it up? As a result, ISKCON ekadashis have often been one day off from the Gaudiya Math and the rest of Indian Hindus, which is really embarassing for a temple.

suchandra · 02-15-2008, 11:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jahnava Nitai Das

The problem here is a westerner, Bhaktarupa Das, without having properly studied jyotisha, has created a new bizarre system of setting the lengths for the divisions of the day (muhurtas). No astrologer in India follows this made up system, so why make it up? As a result, ISKCON ekadashis have often been one day off from the Gaudiya Math and the rest of Indian Hindus, which is really embarassing for a temple.

Thats the GM calendar for February 2008, see below, probably calculated for Sri Dham Mayapur, but they also have a similiar program like ISKCON to calculate any town at, http://scsmath.com/events/calendar/index.html
For Appearance of Sri Nityananda Prabhu, the ISKCON calendar says, 18th February 2008, http://www.iskcon-london.org/calendar/index.html

FEBRUARY 2008

2. (Sat) Krishna-ekadasi. No Fast.
3. (Sun) Krishna-dvadasi. Baynjuli Mahadvadasi. Fast.
4. (Mon) Krishna-trayodasi. Paran by 7:36 a.m.
8. (Fri) Gaura-pratipad. Disappearance of Tridandi Swami Srimad Bhakti Gaurav Vaikhanas Maharaj. Disappearance of Sri Haripada Chaudhuri das Adhikari.
9. (Sat) Gaura-dvitiya. Disappearance of Tridandi Swami Srimad Bhakti Sharan Shanta Maharaj.
11. (Mon) Gaura-panchami. Sri Krishna Vasanta Panchami. Sri Saraswati Puja. Appearance day of Sri Vishnu Priya Devi. Appearance of Srila Pundarik Vidyanidhi, Srila Raghunath das Goswami, and Srila Raghunandana Thakur. Disappearance of Srila Viswanath Chakravarti Thakur, Tridandi Swami Srimad Bhakti Viveka Bharati Maharaj and Tridandi Swami Srimad Bhakti Svarupa Parvat Maharaj.
13. (Wed) Gaura-saptami. Appearance of Mahavishnu Avatar, Sri Advaita Acharyya.
14. (Thu) Gaura-astami. Disappearance of Sripad Virendra Krishna Prabhu.
15. (Fri) Gaura-navami. Disappearance of Srila Madhvacharyya.
16. (Sat) Gaura-dasami. Disappearance of Srila Ramanujacharyya.
17. (Sun) Gaura-ekadasi. Bhaimi Ekadasi. Fast.
18. (Mon) Gaura-dvadasi. Varaha Dvadasi. Paran after the worship of Varahadev and before 9:58 a.m.
19. (Tue) Gaura-trayodasi. Appearance of Sri Nityananda Prabhu. Fast until noon.
20. (Wed) Gaura-chaturdasi. Paran by 9:57 a.m. for those who fasted the previous day.
21. (Thu) Purnima. Appearance of Srila Narottama das Thakur. Sri Krishna's Madhurotsava. Lunar Eclipse.
GOVINDA
26. (Tue) Krishna-panchami. The 135th Divine Appearance festival of the founder of the Sri Chaitanya Math and worldwide Sri Gaudiya Maths, Bhagavan Sri Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Goswami Prabhupad. Anniversary Festival of the installation of Sri Gupta-Govardhan Sri Mandir, Sri Govinda Kunda, Nabadwip. Disappearance of Srila Purushottam Thakur.
27. (Wed) Krishna-sasthi. Appearance of Tridandi Swami Srimad Bhakti Saranga Goswami Maharaj.