By Dhirnayak dasa, Utkal-Banga Padayatra leader
The Utkal-Banga Padayatra has celebrated its first Gaura-purnima festival, the first appearance day of our beloved Sri Gaurasundar. We were at Dhajhola village about 15km from Odagaon, its nearest service town. The villagers were very accommodating and padayatra stayed there for twenty-five days because some of our party went for Navadvipa-mandala Parikrama while the rest of us remained to serve Sri Sri Nitai-Gaurasundar and our oxen. The villagers also insisted we celebrate Gaura-purnima with them.
We were fortunate because Srila Prabhupada disciple Akhildhara Prabhu and All-India padayatris Abhiram dasa and Dhanya Chaitanya dasa also joined our padayatra in time for the festival. We met Akhildhara Prabhu in Mayapur and he very much desired to visit padayatra and we were very happy to receive him and have his association.
On Gaura-purnima day we all performed mangala arati, chanted our rounds and then spent most of the day getting ready for the celebration. The chariot was beautifully decorated with flowers and our enthusiastic padayatris prepared more than fifty-six bhogas for Their Lordships. At the evening programme the sankirtan was going on followed by abhisheka of our utsava deities. Akhildhara Prabhu began and then we all performed abhisheka, first with pancha gavya and then pushpa abhisheka. The festivities concluded with maha arati and prasadam.
That was how we observed Gaura-purnima in a village in Odisha and that’s the beauty of padayatra. It reaches every nook and corner of the village where people may not have heard of ISKCON and blesses them by darshan of Srila Prabhupada and the most merciful Sri Sri Nitai-Gaurasundar. Many Dhajhola residents purchased books and chanting beads from us. I also have kept their follow up and till then they are chanting the holy mantra.
All glories to Sri Sri Nitai-Gaurasundar.
All glories to Srila Prabhupada.
All glories to padayatra.
