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“Hare Rama! Hare Rama! Rama Rama Hare Hare!
Hare Krishna! Hare Krishna! Krishna Krishna Hare Hare!”

The main objective of Sri Swamiji is to propagate ‘Bhagavan Nãma’ (the Name of the Lord) amongst the masses, particularly the downtrodden. Around 25 young devotees of Sri Swamiji visit the villages surrounding our Mathurapuri Ãshram, on weekends and public holidays and chant “Hare Rama” Maha Mantra.

The sessions are broadly divided into two - morning and evening - and are generally of two-hour duration. Each village is served by a group of three or four of these young men. For the first 15 minutes, they go around the village chanting “Hare Rama” and the local children join them. They then assemble at a common place and help the children with their school lessons for an hour and a half. The session concludes with singing of Sri Swamiji’s kirtans and narration of a short story from our puranas. These stories mainly pertain to bhaktas who come from the lower strata of the society.

The response from the villagers is excellent. They chant the Nãma without any inhibition whatsoever. The deep response from the villagers - children and elders alike - is seen in their greeting the young men with “Radhe Krishna!” Presently the focus is on the colonies.

This work began in November 2000 in two villages - Mãhãnyam and Malaipattu. Gradually, the number of villages have increased and the Nãma chanting is carried out in all of them.

Diary of events:

Activities during March 2003:

On the 1st of March, Venkadu and Manimangalam were visited. At Manimangalam Hare Rama was chanted for about an hour at the Bhajanai Mandapam. The villagers participated in the chanting enthusiastically. After chanting Hare Rama, participants from the satsang taught the children some of the kirtans written by Sri Swamigal. The children sang some kirtans and most of them were about Panduranga. The session concluded with distribution of prasad (Sugar candy) to all the participants.

On 2nd, the participants from the Satsang visited Gunduperumbedu, Vellarai, Settupattu, Amarambedu, Malaipattu, Manimangalam and Mahanyam. At Manimangalam village, the chanting was done for 45 minutes by the villagers. The villagers also sang some kirtans.

A new village named Sinna Perungalathur was visited by Sri Kesavan and Srikanth on 8th of March. It is on Tambaram - Vandalur route. They had met the elders at the village and spoke to them about the importance of chanting Hare Rama.

From 16th of March, it was proposed by Sri Swamiji that akhandanama be conducted on every Sunday between 10.00 to 3.00 pm. As per his wishes, akhandanama was being conducted on 16th, 23rd and 30th of March in the houses of Sri Ramachandran, Sri Kalyanakrishnan and Sri Vasanth. There were around 15 to 20 participants from the satsang. Prasad was distributed to all the participants after the akandanãma sankirtan. It was a nice experience for all the participants.

In the evening of March 16th members from the satsang went to Sri Kapaleeswarar Temple, where the "Aruvathimoovar" festival was being celebrated. During this festival all the sixty three Nayanmars were taken in a procession around the 4 Mada veeedis of the temple. Thousands and thousands of people witnessed this festival. Hare Rama was chanted there for around 2 hours from 4.30 pm to 6.30 pm. Devotees who came to witness the festival participated in the chanting enthusiastically.

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