By Jayabhadra devi dasi (IGF preacher ISKCON Amravati and padayatra coordinator)
On March 6, 2026, by the mercy of Guru and Gauranga Amravati’s ISKCON Girls Forum held its seventh annual one-day Vaishnavi padayatra.
This year’s event saw the participation of more than 100 Vaishnavis as well as non-devotees. The youngest Vaishnavi was a four-month-old named Gaurangi, the daughter of a congregation devotee,and the eldest was an 80-year-old mataji.
Starting from the Satidham temple we walked about 4km to the Shri Ekvira Devi temple. Our chief guest was the honorable Divisional Commissioner of the Vidarbha region, Dr Shweta Singhal, who inaugurated the padayatra, did arati of Sri Sri Nitai-Gaurasundar, and inspired the assembled Vaishnavis. She was very happy to see the gathering of Vaishnavis participating in a spiritual event.
Dr Singhal said, “It is very nice to see Vaishnavis coming together for such a spiritual programme and helping each other,” and she also gave a message to educate girls. She said any problem can come in life, so each girl should be educated, should stand on her own two legs and have a job, then she can contribute to society.
All the Vaishnavis and IGF girls enthusiastically performed sankirtan and danced as we moved ahead while making announcements about the importance of padayatra and the maha mantra. We had a grand sankirtan and the Vaishnavis danced to their hearts’ content.
The padayatra took place on International Women’s Day to endow women in spirituality. Our motto is we Vaishnavis cannot walk in padayatra (cannot join any padayatra), so to understand what a padayatra is, to get bliss and the experience of padayatra, to distribute books, prasad and the holy name to the public and remind the culture of padayatra, we organise a Vaishnavi padayatra. As we walk and dance the Vaishnavis also chant the Hare Krishna maha mantra while playing instruments and doing services like book distribution. This year’s dress code was red saree, and it looked very beautiful as matajis moved in a circle producing a visually powerful ring of red fire!
We thank our temple management for helping us by providing us with a sound system and delicious prasadam. It is said that the spiritual programme is incomplete without prasadam, so when we reached the Shri Ekvira Devi temple we all honoured prasadam and distributed it among the people assembled there. Then we had a surprise for everyone. After honouring prasadam, all the Vaishnavis played holi with dry colours, something nobody knew was going to happen.
It was very blissful and we pray that our spiritual master, Lokanath Maharaja, and Srila Prabhupada and all the devotees bless us that we can have such an influential padayatra every year, not only in Amravati but all over India, thus encouraging Vaishnavis in sankirtan and empowering them in spirituality and teaching them the happiness of sankirtan, book distribution and prasadam distribution.
Our team thanks the temple management for helping us, the assembled ladies for joining us, and the police department for their assistance and giving us permission for the padayatra. Also, thanks to the Sati Dham and Shri Ekvira Devi temple management for allowing us and putting faith in us.
All glories to Srila Prabhupada.
