Raghava Pandit

Raghava Pandit

   Shri Raghava Pandit  was exclusively devoted to Shri Gauransundara and was very dear to Him.  Shriman Kavi Karnapura notes in his Gaura Ganodesha Dipika:  “That person who was once the dear gopi friend of Radharani and whose name was Dhanishta later appeared as Shri Raghava Pandit and later lived at Govardhan where he worshiped a Deity of Giridhari in great ecstasy. The gopi Dhanishta,  is always engaged in preparing foods for Shri Krishna.

   The gopi named Gunamala appeared as Raghava Pandit’s sister Damayanti. On the East Bengal railway line beginning from the Sealdah station in Calcutta, there is a station named Sodapura, which is not very far from Calcutta. Within one mile of this station, toward the western side of the Ganges, is a village known as Panihati, in which the residential quarters of Raghava Pandit still exist. On Raghava Pandit’s tomb is a creeper on a concrete platform. There is also a Madana-Mohana Deity in a broken-down Temple nearby. This Temple is managed by a local zamindar of the name Shri Shivachandra Roya Chaudhuri. – Ref CC Adi lila 10.25

   The foods Damayanti cooked for Lord Chaitanya when He was at Puri were carried in bags by her brother Raghava without the knowledge of others.

   The Lord accepted these foods throughout the entire year. Those bags are still celebrated as raghavera jhali (“the bags of Raghava Pandit”).

   Krishna Das Kaviraj describes the contents of the bags of Raghava Pandit in his book Chaitanya Charitamrta. Hearing this narration, Devotees generally cry, and tears glide down from their eyes.