Govardhan Parikramā

Govardhan Parikrama

Twenty-one kilometres around a hill

The Govardhan Parikrama is the circumambulation of the hill of Govardhan in the Braj country of Mathura district, Uttar Pradesh — one of the most performed pilgrimages in North India, and a specifically Krishna-centred one. Govardhan is the hill Krishna is said to have lifted on his little finger to shelter the people of Braj from the deluge, and it is the site of the giriraj — the great circle of the surrounding fifty villages, of which the Mathura-Vrindavan area is the centre. The parikrama is the act of walking that circle, and it is a walk, not a temple visit: the deity of the parikrama is the hill and the route, and the shrines along the way are stations.

The route is conventionally given as about 21 kilometres, and a walker who goes steadily completes it in a day. The customary starting point is Mansi Ganga, and the walk passes the principal kunds — Radhakund, Syamakund, Govardhan and Uddhav Kund, and Jatipura, among others — and finishes at the foot of the hill at Govardhan itself, where the Govardhan temple stands, traditionally identified with the mountain. The path is a rural road and a pilgrim road; the walk is done barefoot by many. The Kartik month, in the autumn, is the busiest season, and Guru Purnima and Gopashtami are particular occasions. The proximity of Govardhan to Radha Kund and Vrindavan means the parikrama is part of the wider Braj circuit, and most who walk it walk it in a Braj pilgrimage that includes the Krishna temples of the area.

A more severe form of the same walk is the dandavat parikrama, in which the devotee lies flat and prostrates at every step of the way. This takes many days or weeks and is a considerable discipline of the body as well as of the mind. It is a real and current practice, not a historical one, and those who have done it describe it as a decisive act. The Govardhan stone — the shila or govardhan parashar — is carried home by pilgrims as a blessing, and the practice of taking a stone from the hill is a devotional act rather than an act of damage, though its environmental cost is a real and contested question in recent years.

The Braj tradition is a Vaishnava tradition with its own liturgical and textual life, distinct from the pan-Indian "Krishna cult" as it is often described. Its rasa theology, its lila narrative, and its Braj-bhasha vernacular song are particular, and the parikrama is one of the ways that theology is made physical.

Sources and what is still unverified

This entry is grounded in the Braj Vaishnava tradition, in the Gita Govinda and the broader Krishna literature as the narrative background, and in the Mathura district gazetteer. A human guardian from a Braj or Vrindavan tradition should supply and check: the current route and the customary starting points, which change with road and development; the local practice for the dandavat form and its season; the environmental question about collecting Govardhan stone, which is a live issue for the shrine and the authorities; and the kunds along the way as a local list, since the stations differ between the Braj tradition and popular route maps. The exact distance of 21 kilometres is the conventional figure; actual routes vary with the start. A pilgrim-count figure should be cited from a count.