By Acarya dasa, All-India Padayatra leader
The All-India padayatris celebrated Nityananda Trayodasi at Savadgaon village in southern Haryana. We had planned to observe the festival at Bhiwani, but as Mr Harivilas got the news that the padayatra was just 30km south of there in the town of Charkhi Dadri, he called us and insisted we visit his nearby village of Savadgaon. Mr Harivilas is a big-time supporter of padayatra and has sponsored a tractor, a motorcycle, an inverter, a battery and a sound system for us. He is always ready to help. I felt Nityananda Prabhu showered his mercy on Mr Harivilasji because of his services to padayatra – and that’s why we could celebrate Nityananda Trayodasi at his village.
There is a large Hanuman temple and ashram at Savadgaon and we stayed there under the shelter of Lord Ram’s servant, Hanumanji. On Nityananda Trayodasi we did abhisheka of our utsava deities and the villagers joined us in the sankirtan and celebration during which we offered more than fifty-six bhogas to Their Lordships. The villagers were pleased to hear the glories of Nityananda and realised how fortunate they were that He was sharing His birthday with them. Prasadam was distributed to all those assembled as well as throughout the village.
Mr Harivilas could not come (he is currently a resident of Noida where he is connected with ISKCON’s Sri Sri Radha-Govind temple) but he had instructed the villagers to support us. When he heard details of the event, he was very happy and said, “While padayatra is in Haryana, I will sponsor evening prasadam.” We had invitations from many places to celebrate Nityananda Trayodasi, but the Lord is so merciful He had already selected Mr Harivilas’ village. Because of him the whole village received Nityananda Prabhu’s mercy.
All of this was the mercy of Nityananda who is Lord Balaram Himself. As Mr Harivilasji has done so much to help padayatra, how could the Lord cross his village and go? The Lord wanted to visit his village and bless his people. In padayatra everything is ordained by the Lord, we just execute it. Nothing goes by our plan; the Lord always has His special plan to bless His devotees.
All glories to Srila Prabhupada and our spiritual master, Lokanath Maharaja, the pioneer of padayatra. Due to their mercy festivities are taking place in villages all over India and padayatra is instrumental.
