By Jayabhadra devi dasi, IGF preacher
On February 26, 2022, we had a one-day Vaishnavi padayatra at Wadad village 15km from Amravati. As a district Medical Officer, I am well acquainted with our health workers, so while our ISKCON Girls’ Forum team did advance party work a few days before padayatra I liaised with fellow employees Anganwadi and Asha and they agreed to join us for padayatra.
Our group received an early-morning welcome at Wadad with the village ladies enthusiastically singing and dancing with us as we covered the whole village, ending the walk at a big banyan tree on the outskirts at 1pm where all the ladies, even the elderly, danced to our hearts’ content.
As everyone rested under the tree, we presented Anganwadi and Asha with maha garlands of our Amravati temple’s Sri Sri Rukmini-Dwarkadhish and the village ladies who helped in padayatra with a photograph of the deities and maha mantra stickers. We also distributed khaja prasadam, a layered fried dessert popular in Odisha and often served to the deities at Puri’s Jagannath temple, to everyone who participated in padayatra. As it was hot, we then honoured lemon juice together and shared our realizations of padayatra.
Our party distributed forty of Srila Prabhupada’s small books at the event and thus our one-day Vaishnavi padayatra at Wadad ended happily.
