Inspiring Story

Madana Mohan das is an 18-year-old brahmacari at the Singapore Hare Krishna temple, Sri Krishna Mandir. He is presently serving his compulsory 2-year National Service as a Private in the Singapore Army at the Jurong Camp. He cannot eat the food provided by the army camp. He would eat only Krishna Prasadam.
When he was enlisted into Basic Military Training (BMT), which lasts 3 months, he was allowed to have his food brought in from the temple. Upon completion of his BMT, he was posted as a driver. The commanding officer then made a request for him to be posted as a clerk so that he could be allowed to have his food brought from the temple and perform his national service without compromising his faith.
However we were told that this request was rejected and he has been disallowed to have his meals to be brought to him from the temple. We have sent a letter dated 15 May 2009 to Mindef (Ministry of Defence) about this situation, but they flatly denied providing any assistance. He was allowed to book out of the camp every Tuesday and Thursday evening and the weekends. Only then had he the chance to eat a proper meal at the temple whereas the rest of the days, he was sustaining on dry ration brought from the temple on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
In the meantime, his superiors forced him to eat the food at his camp and have asked him to cut off his Sikha, the tuft of hair kept by devotees. They charged him twice: once for food and once for the sikha. He chose to go for court marshal. He was told that the trial would be in two weeks’ time. While he was waiting for his trial, they suddenly arrested him without any charge and took him on the 20th of July, 2009, to the Detention Barracks (DB), the army jail, for an indefinite period of rigorous punishment. But Madana Mohan das is going on a hunger strike until death, inside the jail as he would not eat anything except Krishna Prasadam (sanctified food), being a full-time brahmacari.