‘Gour Govind, you will take me to Orissa!’

“Gour Govind, you will take me to Orissa!” — Srila Prabhupada to his dear disciple

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Gopal Krishna: Who, Goura Govinda Swami? He is a very sincere devotee.

Srila Prabhupada: Oh, yes, undoubtedly.

Gopal Krishna: Very sincere.

Srila Prabhupada: Krishna sent him! In Vrindavan he said “Please give me shelter.” I thought that there are so many Indians, they come and go. So when he insisted, [I told him] “All right, you stay.”

Hari-sauri: Yeah. He took sannyasa at the opening of the temple. I remember that.

Srila Prabhupada: He’s a good boy.

Hari-sauri: He’s stuck it out for a long time in Orissa. He’s been there a long time, by himself a lot of the time too.

Srila Prabhupada: Yes. Yes. He’s organizing nicely.

Gopal Krishna: He’s very sincere. He follows all the regulations very rigidly. He gets up in the morning, ideal example.

Jagadish: He understands the philosophy quite well.

Srila Prabhupada: Oh, yes. And he is educated. He is B.Sc. He knows Hindi also.

Editor’s note: Perhaps significantly, this is the only time Srila Prabhupada is recorded to have said “Krishna sent him” about any of his individual disciples. And it is also interesting to note that Srila Prabhupada spoke these words glorifying our Srila Gour Govinda Maharaja in 1977 after many years of being disappointed by his senior disciples, and often expressing so. And further, this wasn’t simply some word of encouragement for his disciple because Srila Gour Govinda Maharaja wasn’t present at that time to hear him say it.

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