Sunday, October 2, 2016

More GBC Complicity in Ongoing Child Abuse?

What Will It Take to Stop the Child Abuse in Vrindavana?

[PADA: It does seem that the GBC's gurus are mainly concerned with maintaining their individual fiefdoms and not factually overseeing the welfare of the overall society, or its citizens, including children, and this has been a pattern since 1978. 

It seems like this process never ends, until these leaders either bloop or die off ... and even after some of their worst offenders die off, a few GBC folks STILL buried Kirtanananda in a samadhi -- so they can continue their process of worship of criminals and sexual predators even after the perps depart their bodies. Anyway, more people are waking up to their real agenda, and that is the good news. ys pd] 

BY: SANAKA RSI DASA

Hare Krsna Anuttama Prabhu,

It has been brought to my attention that children in the Vrindavana Gurukula continue to be sexually abused, and that the management of the school has not been reporting to the CPO. To date, in Vrindavana there is no Child Protection Team independent from the school.

Lila Govinda, the vice principal of the school who has been found guilty of beating the children on more than one occasion has not received any sanctions. For him it's business as usual.

What precedent is the GBC setting by allowing this travesty to continue?

The fundraising for the new school is also going ahead full steam; their office by the main entrance of the Krsna Balaram temple is actively soliciting donations every day, in defiance of the 1 year suspension imposed by the GBC. I wonder if we can expect the GBC to take some action… Who is tasked with enforcing the restrictions? Is it Gopal Krishna Maharaj?

This news does not surprise me of course. After all, these problems have been ongoing for the past 6 years in the Vrindavana Gurukula and as the saying goes: "If you change nothing… nothing will change". Given their track record, it is reasonable to assume that if you allow the same management to run the Vrindavana Gurukula, they will continue to deliver more of the same. They will overlook the abuse of the children, and disregard GBC authority; because that is how they operate.

What does surprise me is the continued endorsement on the part of the GBC, of the current Vrindavana gurukula management despite, their proven incompetence and criminal neglect of the children.

For reasons that escape my comprehension, the GBC has supported and enabled the involvement of this incompetent management, for several years, amid ongoing reports of widespread child abuse in the school. This endorsement on the part of the GBC is criminal.

After the release of the Cost of Silence, the matter of CPO funding was discussed among the GBC, the suggestion of allocating 1% of the TOVP revenue towards child protection was taken in consideration.

In the end it was dismissed because it was deemed that 1% is an arbitrary figure, and that it was necessary to have an adequate estimation of the CPO's funding needs.

The result has been that to date the CPO has not received ANY extra funding…

In your response to the Cost of Silence you went to great lengths to try and convince your readership that the CPO is an autonomous entity and that the GBC does not interfere with Child Protection matters. Yet we see time and again that the facts tell a different story…

I understand that the problems with the Vrindavana and Mayapur Gurukula will be discussed in the upcoming meetings in Mumbai. I have also been told that Kamlesh Krishna prabhu, the new CPO Director, has not been invited to partake in these meetings…

Wouldn't it be a good idea to invite the Director of the CPO to such meetings?

What puzzles me is that the GBC continues to operate from a paradigm that has not been working for the past 50 years, but somehow you seem to be hoping against hope, that miraculously, these very same policies will deliver different results.

I am no clairvoyant seer, but I assure you that unless the GBC implements some radical changes to your child protection policies, you can only reasonably expect that more children will be abused.

What I would really like to witness is the day when ISKCON will start to value its children enough to put their hands in their deep pockets and hire actual professionals, instead of having part time, untrained, and far too busy GBC men, trying to run child protection as if it was a hobby, while at the same time also pretending that they are not really involved…

Would you have a part time volunteer draw up the plans for the TOVP? Of course not, that would be reckless and insane!

The way ISKCON has been running Child Protection is also reckless and insane. The results speak for themselves.

As far as I can see, the GBC only has two responsible options with regards to the Vrindavana Gurukula:

1) A complete overhaul of the management; to be replaced with qualified and experienced individuals that have a proven track-record.

2) Shut down the school.

I sincerely hope that the GBC starts to afford child protection the importance it deserves.

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