Goals
- To bring Krishna consciousness to prisons around the world, to provide opportunities for inmates to practice Krishna consciousness, and to guide inmates in their spiritual life.
- In 1962 Srila Prabhupada wrote as one of the goals in the prospectus for his League of Devotees (the precursor to ISKCON): 'To take charge of moral upliftment by spiritual process even for the criminals and prisoners of state, and to accept all kinds of help and facilities from the police and government concerned'.
Details
- ISKCON Prison Ministries continues the work of ISKCON devotees who have been helping inmates for many years. Devotees worldwide are writing to inmates and visiting prisons. IPM is trying to expand and co-ordinate this work in North America and beyond.
- The Ministries' preachers counsel and inspire inmates trying to become Krishna conscious. IPM has been successful in getting Srila Prabhupada's books to inmates who want them. The Ministries' programs in prisons feature chanting, sharing prasadam, and studying and distributing Srila Prabhupada's books. Some inmates quickly become vegetarian and understand that Lord Krsna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead. As inmates refer other inmates to Krsna consciousness, the work expands.
Plans
- To place Srila Prabhupada's books in prison libraries worldwide; to start The Freedom Journal, a newspaper for inmates; to provide inmates a correspondence course on Krishna consciousness; and to find devotees in each state in the US to place books in prison libraries in their state.
Contact
- Chandrasekar Prabhu
Director of IPM / Volunteer Coordinator
1400 Cherry Street
Denver, CO 80220
+1 (303) 520 9486
chandra16108@yahoo.com
- Mother Shyama Priya deva dasi
Book Distribution / Volunteer Coordinator
711 East Blacklidge Drive
Tucson, Arizona 85719
(520) 792-0630
shyamapriya@aol.com
- Bhakta Jerry
Newsletter Editor
ISKCON Chicago
1716 West Lunt Avenue
Chicago, Illinois 60626
(773) 973-0900
jerryschutt@hotmail.com
- Bhaktin Heather
Po Box 42424
Tucson, AZ 85733-2424
- Uruguay (Montevideo)
Kartikeya Prabhu
kartikeyadas@hotmail.com
- Brazil (Sao Paulo)
Acyuta Krishna Das
acyutakrishnadas@hotmail.com
- India (Tamil Nadu)
Jaikumar Prabhu
Mobile: +91-98415 62680
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ISKCON Prison Ministries: Service Opportunities

Reading some letters from jail will convince you that the prison environment can be a fertile ground to develop self realization and devotion to Krishna. To expand our preaching effort, we need help with the following tasks:
Details:
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Database Development
Currently we have a database that is not very functional. We need someone more experienced to create a new database to keep track of inmates, books, donations, print invoices for shipments and mailing labels. Making the database available online would also be nice.
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Administrator for Correspondence Courses
Prior to Mukta Kesa Prabhu's departure in 2007, he was administering many correspondence courses to inmates, including Bhagavad-gita (several different levels), Coming Back, Science of Self-Realization, and others. IPM has not been able to continue this much needed service since Mukta Kesa Prabhu's departure. This service can be done comfortably from your home and is a great opportunity to dive deeper into Srila Prabhupada's books, facilitating others to do the same.
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Book Donations
We need cases of hardbound Bhagavad-gitas and one case of Coming Back.
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Collecting Prison Addresses
We are on a quest to send letters to every prison librarian and chaplain in the United States, offering a set of Srila Prabhupada's books. We have written to about ten states so far, receiving nice responses. We need devotee(s) to extract addresses of prisons from websites and collect them in a spreadsheet, to be used to send letters to each one.
Devotees interested in any of these services, please write to bhaktajerry@gmail.com.
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ISKCON Prison Ministries Freedom Newsletters

Selected articles & artwork from recent IPM Newsletters. Click here to read these newsletters as online-books.
Srila Prabhupada:
"If we can induce even one person to understand that our real home is in the spiritual world, if we can convince this philosophy to even a single person, that is the success of our missionary activities."
Essays from Devotees behind Bars
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