October 14th to November 13th, 2008

	Offer ghee lamps to Their Lordships Sri Sri Radha Krishna-Chandra during the auspicious month of Karthika and join us to celebrate the spiritually enlivening  month-long Deepotsava festival to the accompaniment of soul-stirring devotional music. It is celebrated by singing a very enchanting song on the Damodara lila of Lord Krishna, the pastime of mother Yashoda binding child Krishna to the grinding mortar.  Lord Krishna came to be known as Damodara due to this pastime.
Deepotsava at Sri Radha Vrindavan Chandra Mandir - Vrindavan.                   CLICK HERE TO  ENLARGE

Once mother Yashoda was letting her lovely son Krishna suck her breast.  Suddenly she saw the milk on the stove overflow, so she immediately put Krishna down and went to set the overflowing milk pan in order.  Child Krishna, for His own pleasure, became angry due to being abandoned in that manner by His mother.  So He broke the pot of butter kept there for churning and ate the butter in a secluded place.  Mother Yashoda sought Krishna all over.  She found a big wooden grinding mortar, which was kept upside down, and she found her son sitting on it.  Krishna saw her coming to Him with a stick in her hand, and immediately He got down from the grinding mortar and began to flee in fear.


Mother Yashoda chased Him all around the garden.  Although she was tired, she somehow reached her naughty child and captured Him.  Mother Yashoda then threw away her stick.  In order to punish Him, she endeavored to bind Him up to the wooden grinding mortar.  But when she tried to bind Him, she found that the rope she was using was short by two inches.  She gathered more ropes from the house and added to it, but at the end she found the same shortage.  In attempting to bind her son, she became tired.  She was perspiring, and the garland on her head fell down.

Then Lord Krishna appreciated the hard labor of His mother, and being compassionate upon her, He agreed to be bound by the ropes.  Krishna, playing as a human child in the house of mother Yashoda, was performing His own selected pastimes.

During this festival, ISKCON Sri Radha Krishna Mandir, Bangalore is decorated with thousands of lamps and there is display of grand fireworks.  The temple altar is decorated with lamps of various shapes and sizes and a song, Damodarashtaka, is sung during the arati.  During this month the devotees take vow to offer a ghee lamp to the Deities of Sri Radha Krishna-Chandra everyday.

Click here to view a slide show of  Deepotsava 2007	Click here to hear the Sri Damodarastaka