Eternal Bliss……in Radhe Radhe!!

It is almost a year and half when I visited my parent’s house at Kanpur. I miss those days spent with my family. I remember that it was decided by me and by my father that daily we are going to visit one temple in the morning and market places in the evening.

It was Sunday, as far as I can recall, we planned for Iskcon Temple, also known as Shri Shri Radha Madhav Mandir. The temple is situated on Mainavati Marg, Nawabganj, Kanpur. It takes around 20-30 minutes time to reach to that place from Kanpur main city. We reached there by 12:20 pm.

ISKCON, International Society for Krishna Consciousness, was founded by His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada in 1966. Since then a number of Iskcon temples are built at different places in India. At Kanpur, the construction of this temple started around four years back and is still in progress. At present, the temple site consists of a hall with beautifully dressed idols of Radha and Lord Krishna at the centre and their paintings on almost all the walls. The temple is well surrounded by a small garden.

As we all know, cows are supreme friends of Lord Krishna. Goshalas, large space for the protection of cows, is also available near the temple. Devotees believe that offering respect and giving grass as feed to the cows will help to diminish their past sinful activities.

Suddenly, we saw people rushing inside the temple. Actually it was 12:30 pm, which is Aarti time. Inside the temple, there were beautifully decorated idols of Radha-Krishna. These idols were bejeweled with the garlands made of red, yellow, orange and white colored flowers. The temple’s surrounding was echoing with Hare Rama Hare Krishna……

In Iskcon Temple, Aarti is done three times, first at 8 am in the morning, second at 12:30 pm and third in the evening at 8 pm. After every Aarti, doors (or in Hindi we call Pat) are closed so as to serve food to God. This served food is distributed among peoples as Prasads. On week days in Prasad, fruits, panchamrit and khichdi (sabudaana khichdi on the days of fast) while on weekend’s in place of khichdi, dal, chawal, khadi, roti and sabzi are given. After this, the temple is closed for 3 hours that is from 1 pm to 4 pm. It is believed that God takes rest during this time.

People from far and nearby places throng this place to see beautifully decorated idols of Radha-Krishna, to perform religious activities, sing bhajans and take rest in peace. We also did the same thing and enjoyed for whole day. Actually for me it is a must visit place when in Kanpur. For lunch we took puri, aloo sabzi and some pickles with us. Although snacks, drinking water, tea etc. were available in the temple premises but it is always advised to keep food items and drinking water when you plan to go out for whole day especially with children for this temple or any other place.