By Akinchan Bhakta Dasa
For the divine pleasure of Srila Prabhupada and our spiritual master, Lokanath Maharaja. Twenty twenty-four is very special for us as our Gurudev completed seventy-five years,so as an offering to him his disciples planned to do seventy-five one-day padayatras. With this in mind devotees at ISKCON Noida’s Radha Govind temple held a one-day padayatra on July 28 in the village of Sorkha near sector 115.
The planning for padayatra had started just a few days before and when we presented the proposal to our temple co-president, Vedant Chaitanya Dasa,he became very happy and granted his approval to fulfil the desire of Lord Chaitanya.
Padayatra began from the Sorkha goshala around 5pm and included more than thirty congregation devotees.Despite his busy schedule our senior God-brother,Hari Kirtan Dasa, gave his precious time and attended the entire event to motivate the devotees. Regardless of his advanced age Aniruddha Dasa also walked with us, which filled everyone with energy and enthusiasm. We had a harinama sankirtan rath as well as halwa and khichadi prasadam for distribution, both courtesy of the temple.
As soon as we arrived in Sorkha and started the sankirtan villagers came near the rath and took darshan of Sri Sri Krishna-Balaram. The spiritual sound of the Lord’s holy name attracted thousands of residents who chanted and danced with us.Hari Kirtan Dasa, Vallabh Nimai Dasa, Jamuna Jivan Dasa,Audarya Purush Dasa, and Bhakta Ram and Bhakta Laxman did melodious sankirtan that made everyone sing and dance for Lord Chaitanya’s pleasure.
Our book distribution in-charge Nama Parayan Dasa and Bhakta Dhiraj and their team distributed more than fifty transcendental books of Srila Prabhupada. Meanwhile our Vaikuntha kids and mothers distributed more than 500 drona of halwa and khichadi prasadam to villagers. As padayatra passed through the village streets people came out of their houses to walk with us and there were also a few four-legged padayatris including cows and bulls taking part.
Having walked for 4km padayatra concluded at Siva Gate. Devotees who took part in the padayatra felt blessed and were thanking Srila Prabhupada and Lokanath Maharaja for introducing this wonderful preaching programme. The villagers were happy and requested the devotees to kindly visit Sorkha again to organize such an occasion.
We would like to express our heartfelt gratitude to ISKCON founder-acharya A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada and Lokanath Maharaja for their blessings. We are also thankful to the entire congregation of ISKCON Noida,especially the devotees of Bhakti Vinod Sabha by whose efforts this one-day padayatra was completed successfully.
Padayatra ki jai.
Srila Prabhupada ki jai.
