(From HG Hari Sauri Prabhu’s “Transcendental Diary” Volume 5)

“So Srimad Bhagavatam, everything threadbare discussed, very practical, and Absolute Truth. There are social, political, religious [matters]. Everything is discussed very scientifically. So here the example is given of the woman, pumscali. There are three kinds of woman: kamini, svairini, and pumscali, according to sastra. So they become [spoiled]. Just like children. They are innocent, and if they are given freedom they will be spoiled. Everyone knows it. If you don’t give proper training to the child and allow him to do independently whatever he likes, that means that child is spoiled.” To this effect he cited Canakya Pandita and the Hindi poet Tulasi dasa and said that their opinion is the same as the Vedic opinion, that women should not be independent.

Prabhupada knows how contentious this is; he had plenty of experience of it last year in America. Still, he dealt with it frankly, as a matter of scriptural principle. Glancing over to his female disciples, he smiled gently and told us, “So this statement will not be very palatable to the Western girls. They want independence. In Chicago, when I was there, they talked about independence of the woman. They asked me question. So I replied, ‘No, woman cannot be given independence.’ So there was a great agitation against me. In many papers I was very much criticized. But actually it is the fact, because they are innocent, not so intelligent and… These are all practical. We may avoid discussing, but Bhagavata is very open for discussing all subject matter. That is fact. We should not hide anything artificially. We must discuss the fact.

“Not only here; Manu samhita recommends, ‘A woman should not be given independence.’ For their interest they must be protected by father, husband, and sons, because if they are polluted, they become very dangerous.” He again referred to a Canakya Pandita sloka, which lists four kinds of living entities one should avoid. “If you live with a dushta bharya [unchaste wife] and a duplicitous friend and an answer-giving servant and a snake, then you are sure to die sometime. You’ll be cheated.”

Prabhupada made it clear that this was not an across-the-board condemnation of women but an example for comparison on the theme of this chapter. “So these things are there. The purpose is that our mind is like that, pumscali, unchaste wife. Not that everyone is unchaste. We have got many examples, the character of woman. It is not that. It is not generalization. But there is chance. If they are not controlled, not properly educated, there is chance of becoming pumscali, and there have been many instances that woman, for being attracted by paramour, has killed even one’s own son. There are cases.”

He cited the great mahajana Bhishmadeva who advised that this control means being shy. “If you break that shyness, then there will be disaster. That is the control valve naturally given. And woman’s shyness is one [type of] beauty. And command also.”