ISKCON NewsThe News Agency of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness

Despite proposed changes and fees, London’s 41st Ratha Yatra (Chariot Festival) will be held this June 28 on the streets of the British capital without any modifications from previous years, after extensive negotiations with government and police.

Police have offered their traffic management and security services free to the parade for the past forty years.

On June 17, ISKCON Youth Ministry’s fourteenth annual Krishna Culture Festival Tour set off on a 16,000 mile epic journey, during which it will visit almost every state and province in North America.

Thirty-three excited youth were on board, down from last year’s fifty-five due to the damaged economy. But on the positive side, regular “bus tourians” have bowed out this year to make way for new faces from countries as diverse as Italy, Bolivia, Canada, Ireland, and even Taiwan.

NEW VRINDABAN, West Virginia, USA -- Saving cows, the Hare Krishnas in this village have learned, is a lot easier in India.

Created four decades ago, New Vrindaban was the first cattle sanctuary in the U.S. At its peak, it had 434 bovine refugees. Today, the cattle population is down to 80 because there's not enough money to support more. So the Hare Krishna community is borrowing a tactic more commonly used by charities that try to save people.

Govinda-Prema Dasa, an ISKCON devotee from Nairobi, gifted Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga with a copy of Srila Prabhupada’s Bhagavad-gita this May.

The opportunity arose when devotees attended the same Sikh community college opening that the Prime Minister had been invited to speak at. After Odinga’s speech promoting higher education as the way to a peaceful and happy country, Govinda-Prema approached him.

On Wednesday, June 24, 2009, ISKCON Baroda's 28th annual Jagannath
Rathayatra Mahotsav, aka “Festival of the Chariots”, was observed in the
usual grand manner.

Baroda Mayor and recently elected Member of Parliament, Sri Balkrishna
Shukla, inaugurated the procession by sweeping the road in front of the
Lord's Rath (Chariot) with a golden handled broom, following the age old
tradition of the Maharajah of Puri, at the Baroda Railway Station at 2:30
PM, on Wednesday, June 24, 2009, which corresponds to the auspicious day of
“Aashadh shukla dvitiyaa” (the second day of the fortnight of the waxing
moon in the month of “Aashadh” on the Hindu calendar).

On May 22 this year, devotees in the West African city of Lome, Togo, inaugurated their new vegetarian restaurant with a celebration and feast.

The restaurant’s origins go back five years ago when devotees, encouraged by their late guru Bhakti-Tirtha Swami’s directions on simple living and high thinking, established an active Food For Life program in Lome and surrounding areas.

VADODARA: When annual rath yatra of Lord Jagannath passes through the by-lanes of the city on Wednesday, devotees will witness a couple from US joining them with chants of Hare Rama, Hare Krishna, like many other foreign disciples of International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) movement over the years.

Vadodara (Baroda), India: Police heaved a sigh of relief after the Jagannath rath yatra concluded peacefully on Wednesday night at the ISKCON Temple. Having received intelligence input about a possible terror attack during the yatra, city police were on tenterhooks and had made stringent security measures on the entire route.

Knowledge of the three modes (guṇa-traya) proves to be fruitful on a variety of levels. The principles that offer insight into the working of individuals also illuminate the characteristics of entire cultures or civilizations.

Did you know the words laser, scuba, and radar aren’t technically words. They’re acronyms. Laser is an acronym for light amplification by the stimulated emission radiation. Scuba is an acronym for self-contained underwater breathing apparatus. And, radar is an acronym for radio detection and ranging.

Many of us harbor the “make my day” fantasy, emblazoned into the American psyche by Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry. Americans get mad — and get even. However, when people pursue such satisfaction they run the risk of triggering someone else’s thirst for revenge, and so begins a recurring, sometimes escalating, cycle.

June 20, New Vrindaban, West Virginia – This weekend sees devotees and guests from all over North America and the world pour into ISKCON’s New Vrindaban community for the third annual 24 Hour Kirtan Festival, a celebration of India’s ancient practice of call and response chanting.

The event is modeled after the original 24 Hour Kirtan in Vrindaban, India. First launched in 1975, the program faded away three years later, but was revived in 1986 by Srila Prabhupada disciple Aindra Dasa. Since then, devotees at ISKCON’s Krishna Balaram Mandir have chanted God’s names non-stop—24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Inspired by the legendary “chipped rice festival” described in Caitanya-Caritamrita, ISKCON’s International School in Mayapur, India transformed into the ancient village of Panihati this June 6.

The original festival was held 500 years ago during the time of Gaudiya Vaishnavism founder Sri Chaitanya, when Chaitanya’s close associate Nityananda Prabhu directed his follower Raghunatha Dasa Goswami to organize a festival and feed all the devotees with yogurt and chipped rice.

Devotees who have served in ISKCON for at least five years will now be entitled to fifteen days of free accommodation and food per year at Sridham Mayapur, ISKCON’s headquarters in India.

“The offer is a gesture of appreciation for devotees’ dedication to Srila Prabhupada’s movement,” says Padmanayana Dasa, Head of International Devotee and Guest Care. “We want all ISKCON devotees to think of Mayapur as their home.”

To anyone committed to bringing about a transformation in the iniquitous ways of this world’s misdirected civilization I recommend an ancient system as guide for this undertaking. The system is a science, containing, like any science, both theory and practice. By theory I mean an organized set of categories that illuminate the workings of the world, and by practice I mean the application of the theory to the world so as to bring about desired changes.