Aniruddha Sherbow is a devotee of ISKCON.
By Deepak Chitnis
WASHINGTON, DC: A man named Aniruddha Sherbow was arrested on Wednesday after being pursued by law enforcement officials for his self-proclaimed vendetta against Hawaiian Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI), a vendetta that Sherbow said could only end in Gabbard’s decapitation.
“I, Aniruddha Sherbow, with the Divine as my witness, do hereby solemnly vow to find Tulsi Gabbard, wheresoever [sic] she may be, and to sever her head from her body,” Sherbow allegedly wrote in an email he sent to the FBI earlier this month.
The drama between Sherbow and Gabbard started several years ago, according to a story that was originally run by the Hawaii Reporter and picked up by Talking Points Memo (TPM), a political news blog based in Washington, DC. Sherbow had tried to be a volunteer in Gabbard’s office when she was a City Councilwoman for Honolulu. Around that time, Gabbard allegedly made Sherbow feel as if she was shirking her responsibilities as a devotee of a specific sect of Hinduism, the Hare Krishna Movement, also known as the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), a branch of Hinduism that involves specific devotion to the God Krishna and his consort Radha.
Sherbow says that Gabbard was born into the movement, as was he; more specifically, Gabbard’s parents are supposedly tied to a somewhat more extremist sub-sect that has been called a “cult” by many. Sherbow apparently thought that she is bringing shame to it mainly by being a politician in America and not following the sect’s guidelines with rigid adherence.
After sending Gabbard a particularly nasty text message, an injunction was filed against Sherbow by a Hawaiian district court, which forbade him from having any physical or electronic contact with Gabbard for at least three years. Ignoring the courts, Sherbow sent a reported 35 text messages, emails, and phone calls to Gabbard over a period of roughly three weeks, which were “extremely inappropriate, profane, vulgar, and sexual,” according to Gabbard.
“She’s been getting tons of praise and accolades. She is completely undeserving of any of them,” Sherbow allegedly wrote on a Topix.com message board. “She has shamelessly abused the trust that the people placed in her. Now she should go get a real job.”
Another theory, proposed by Gabbard herself, is that Sherbow is in league with “homosexual extremist supporters” within the Hare Krishna movement, who oppose her father’s fight against gay and lesbian marriages.
The FBI and US Capitol Police arrested Sherbow in Mexico, and he is now being held behind bars and awaiting an arraignment, with a trial date forthcoming. It’s almost certain that more of this mystery will come out in court, but at least it appears that Rep. Gabbard is safe from Sherbow’s vaguely motivated harassment.
To contact the author, email to deepakchitnis@americanbazaaronline.com