50 Years of Iskcon
- Arushi Gupta
- Aug 29, 2015
- 2 min read
With just a few days left for Janmashtami, we thought this to be the most appropriate time to post about Iskcon and its 50th Anniversary celebrations. The main attraction of the pious birth place of Lord Krishna - Vrindavan, is the Iskcon Temple which will be celebrating its 50 years in the upcoming year.
Construction of this modern Krishna Temple takes us way back to 1965, when A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada , being 69 years of age left his hometown Vrindavan to spread the message of peace and love throughout the world . He struggled in the New York City but with his spirituality and devotion, he was able to make ISCKON a worldwide devotional network.
With a handful of devotees, he managed to register his International Society for Krishna Consciousness in New York. As the saying goes “Droplets of water constitute the Ocean”, today there are almost 400 Iskcon centres and thousands of devotees all throughout the globe. Iskcon is behind some prestigious educational institutions such as Bhaktivedanta College in Belgium. Iskcon charities such as Food for Life and Iskcon Food Relief Foundation feed millions of needy and starving all over the world.
August 13, 2015 marked as the 50th anniversary of the efforts made by Swami Pradaprabhu in building Isckon an international name. Across the globe, Isckon centres commemorated celebrations like whole day festivals. In Chandigarh, devotees went on streets enchanting Krishna devotional songs and kirtans to invite the crowd for the year-long celebration of 50 years. The Jaladuta Yatra was organized by Isckon, Kolkata in the Netaji Indoor Stadium which was a great inspirational event for the devotees.
“Devotees from 106 countries practiced bhakti yoga together at the Kshudiram Anushilan Kendra here, creating a record for “Most Nationalities in a Yoga Lesson” in the Guinness World Records, while another 105 devotees sang Bengali choir to set the record”, Iskcon’s Vice President VN Das claimed.
All in all, the growth and impact that Iskcon has been able to make world over since its inception is incredible and has set an example for charitable communities of how to contribute towards humanity with the minimum of resources. Hopefully we'll be seeing some grand events next year in the same context!