Are the current changes in India’s religious landscape with the spreading of intolerant religions part of Krishna’s plan?

I am troubled by the changing religious landscape in India. Members of a certain religious community are proliferating and visible everywhere. These people look down upon other religions and some of their leaders talk about violence against ‘idol worshippers’. These people are aggressively spreading their religion in India as evident from their large population and large number of religious structures all over India. I worry about the future of India and its unique Vedic identity. How should I deal with negative, depressing sentiments and fears associated with this? Is all this Krsna’s plan?

Question I am troubled by the changing religious landscape in India members of a certain religious community are proliferating and visible everywhere, these people look down upon other religions and some of their leaders talk about violence against idol worshippers, these people are aggressively spreading their religion in India as evident from their large population and large number of religious structures all over India I worry about the future of India and its unique Vedic identity how should I deal with negative depressing sentiments and fears associated with this, is all this Krishna’s plan answer this is not Krishna’s plan, it is a part of Kali’s plan ultimately it is sanctioned by Krishna but the specific activities in the age of Kali happen because the souls desire to enjoy separate from Krishna in a wholesale unregulated way and that is facilitated by Kali so just like it is said in the Padma Purana that the spreading of Mayavad through the descent of Shankaracharya was a part of the plan of Kali, part of the way was a way in which Kali could spread so Kali can spread through gross materialism and Kali can spread through shallow and pseudo religion so shallow religion is when people actually are simply interested in materialistic things but they do it in a religious garb so many religious today are actually just a search for, are more a search for political power under the garb of religion rather than a search for spiritual truth so that is just the unfortunate reality and that is not just true for some specific Abrahamic religions but it is also true for in some ways for some some of the religious expressions within the Vedic tradition also but of course the distinctive differences between the Abrahamic and the Vedic religious traditions are are irreducible and significant generally most of the, almost none of the Vedic traditions are intolerant towards other forms of religion although at intellectual level they will try to establish the superiority and also they don’t talk about eliminating other religions the way the Abrahamic religions talk about and often certainly not by violence so how should we respond to this I have answered another question about how do we respond to religious conversions in India you can hear that answer but suffice it to say that we can do two main things over here we need to cultivate rigor in sadhana and vigor in outreach so it’s not that this is a battle of just one religion against another religion but it is a battle of the lower modes of passion and ignorance against the mode of goodness to the extent that we remain we means the followers of the Vedic tradition if we remain in the mode of passion and ignorance then even our religion will not be much better than their religion although it may be less intolerant but it may also remain materialistic on the cultural point of view certainly idol worship what is condemned as idol worship will be protected by those followers who are following the Vedic tradition so there are many advantages of India preserving its unique Vedic identity and we need to do what we can so that means what can we do we can first of all fight off the modes of passion and ignorance within our own psyche and when we come to goodness then we will be able to see clearly and respond effectively and vigor in outreach we are not just propagators of an institution we want to be vehicles for the raising of global consciousness so when we are reasonably situated in goodness and we try vigorously to share Krishna Consciousness according to whatever capacity we are given we can be used by Krishna to make significant differences so if we look at this 50 years before Krishna Consciousness was just one religious sub-sect among many such sub-sects in Bengal but since Srila Prabhupada’s vigorous outreach things have changed so dramatically and now Krishna Consciousness is a worldwide tradition one of the respected and vibrant branches of the Vedic tradition and if we continue sharing Krishna Consciousness then this will continue further so essentially we need to see this primarily from a spiritual perspective not spiritual philosophical perspective so we see this as the effects of moral passion and ignorance and they have to be combated individually within and socially without by sadhana and outreach. Now beyond that if some devotees have the inclination the ability and the connections by which they can network with some organizations within the Vedic tradition which can act in a more socially culturally or politically influential way to combat the changes in the religious landscape of India then they can do that as a part of their service that means that we work on the networking level if we have that particular zeal so networking has its challenges because as I said if the organization within the Vedic tradition also in mode of passion and ignorance if they identify themselves more as Hindus than as spiritual then there can be some challenges in the networking but surely that can be done and there are some devotees who are doing that at some levels so in a sense it can be like the networking of the brahmanas and the kshatriyas so still Prabhupada found it is primal to be a brahmanical institution but eventually for the brahmanas to be effective there has to be some networking with the kshatriyas so just as Buddhism spread when Ashoka took it up just as Christianity spread when the Roman Empire became holy that is the Roman Empire accepted the Christian doctrine that’s how generally religious traditions become influential when they are able to be able to influence the leaders of society so if we can network in that way then we should definitely try to do that but in general if that is not an area of service then we should do our part and not let negative depressing thoughts influence us because we have to see that Krishna has given us a particular role and if we think that it is our responsibility to do what is not in our power to do then we simply bring worry upon ourselves in the name of responsibility if we are not empowered to solve certain problems then better we focus on the problems that we have been given the power to solve and by that we are contributing the solution and if Krishna wants he will give us more power by which we will be able to solve the bigger problems also but if we simply in the name of responsibility go to worry then we will not be able to do what we currently have the power to do also so if Prabhupada had a vision to share Krishna consciousness all over the world but the way he acted was step by step similarly when we act step by step doing what we can do with rigor in our sadhana and vigor in our outreach to combat the modes of passion and ignorance then we will be able to contribute effectively towards in a small way but a small but significant and effective way towards preserving and propagating the glorious spiritual culture of India Thank you.