“It is better if the temple presidents are selected only for a single 4-year term.”

While some features of Drutakarma Prabhu's proposal are ok, an important drawback, in my humble opinion, is that there is far too much power given to temple presidents.

It is they who have the greatest impact on the day-to-day life of the devotees in their area.

By keeping them for life, and putting all ministries under them, they are being given full license to do as they please. It is easy even for a sincere devotee to get allured by Maya into thinking that, as temple president, he is omnipotent and omniscient. The procedures to remove him would be so difficult, that ordinary devotees would prefer to just stay away from the temple where the temple president has become tyrannical or is just uninspiring or inefficient. As we know, this is quite common today.

It is better if the temple presidents are selected only for a single 4-year term. They would have to be re-elected for each term. They should be removable by a petition to the GBC by a simple majority of initiated devotees living in the area. After all, if the majority of the initiated devotees of the area do not want the temple president to continue, then how will the temple flourish if he stays on due to the difficulty of removing him?

Compulsory rotation after 2 terms would be even better. This would ensure that the temple presidents' power hunger would be curbed, knowing they would become ordinary devotees again, or have to move to a different temple in due course. This would improve their performance, and enhance their spiritual life, by cultivation of humility.

© CHAKRA 9-May-2000

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