Annually when the Lord of the universe, Jagannath alongwith His siblings – Baladev and Subhadra come out of Their temple to shower mercy by glancing with Their big round eyes during the month of Asad, as per the Vedic calendar is known as Rath Yatra. The scriptures mention that whoever takes darshan of the gleeful grin of Jagannath seated on His cart cuts the knot of repeated birth and death of this material world. The devotees of ISKCON Mayapur will be celebrating Jagannath Rath Yatra on 25th June afternoon onwards. The deities of Lord Jagannath, Baladev and Subhadra will be seated on three different carts and taken out in a grand procession from the ISKCON Jagannath temple Rajapur to Chandradaya temple at Mayapur. The most unique feature of Rath Yatra at Mayapur is that it becomes a symbol of equality and integration as people from various communities enthusiastically participate in it. For years it has been a practice in Mayapur that the barriers of caste, creed, community, color fall apart and people turn up in large numbers to get a glance of Lord Jagannath seated in His divine flower decked cart.
The preparations and planning for the festival began on the day of Akshay Trithia and since then more than 100 devotees have been toiling night and day. On 25th June morning the celebrations will begin from the wee hours of morning. The devotees will be decorating the cart with colourful flowers, garlands, flags, lamps. In the afternoon, amidst the chanting of Vedic mantras by the students of Gurukula, the deities will be carried into their respective carts- Taladwaja of Lord Baladev, Devadanala of Subhadra Devi and Nandighosa of Lord Jagannath. The procession will start from Rajapur at 2.00pm , pass through Chand Kazi Samadhi, Bamanpukur Bazar, Balaldighi on Bhakti Sidhhanta Saraswati Road, covering a distance of 6km. The procession will feature congregational chanting ( sankirtan) , dance, musical performances by the devotees. Further, accompanying the chariots devotees will play drums, tambourines, trumpets, cymbals . On way, the deities will be showered with flowers and offered fruits, sweets like “payash” “khaja” and other delicacies. Rath Yatra in Mayapur draws huge crowd and this year also the expected turnout will be more than a lakh people so the ISKCON authorities have made elaborate arrangements by installing numerous booths on the way which will be capable of rendering help to people incase of any emergency. For the first time a magnificent Gundicha Temple has been constructed at Prabhupad ghat along the Ganga and the deities will be kept there till the Ulta Rath, to be held on 3rd July and during this period everyday cultural events will be rendered for the pleasure of Lord Jagannath, he stated. Another attraction of this year will be “Tulavarnam”, wherein the devotees and guests will offer to Jagannath items like ghee, fruits, jaggery and other items equal to their own body weight. During the 9 days stay in Gundicha, devotees bring many gifts for Jagannath like gorgeous dress, turban, flower garlands and food items like pizzas, ice-cream, cakes, sweet rice to name a few.
The festival commemorates the annual journey of Lord Jagannath, Lord Baladev, and their sister Subhadra to their aunt’s place, the Gundicha Temple and anyone who gets the opportunity to pull their cart on way is bestowed with the benediction of washing away all the sins he may have committed in all his previous births. The Rath Yatra was first celebrated by ISKCON in San Francisco in the year 1967 by HDG A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada , founder Acharya of ISKCON and currently it is being organised in all the 650 centres across the world.
Subroto Das
Servant in ISKCON Mayapur Media Communications
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