The story behind Shyam Kund’s irregular shape

Radhakund Shyamkund

After learning that the five trees lining Shyam Kund were in reality the Pandavas, Raghunathdas Goswami decided against uprooting them. The boundary was eventually built along the contours of the tress, lending the kund an asymmetrical shape.

Vrindavan, 2021-10-21 (Vrindavan Today News): At the time when Mahaprabhu discovered Shyam and Radhakund in the paddy fields of Aritha village, neither was there any clean water in the two sacred water bodies nor any solid boundary defining them.

Many years later a thought came upon His disciple Srila Raghunathdas Goswami to have the kunds cleaned and delineated. Unable to comprehend the divine intervention behind it, he at once admonished himself for allowing a material aspiration to arise in his mind. Even though not tainted with the desire for personal sense gratification, it would have diverted Raghunathdas’ attention to mundane pursuits involving money, thereby contaminating his spiritual consciousness. 

Meanwhile, a rich merchant who was on Badrinath Yatra with the resolve to donate a huge sum of money was instructed in a dream by Bhagwan Badrinath Himself to offer this amount to Raghunathdas for the restoration of Shyam and Radha kund. Making a detour to Aritha, the merchant met Goswamiji and narrated the entire incident to him while handing over the funds.

Realising it as divine will, Raghunathdas accepted the donation. Soon enough the two kunds were desilted and consecrated in accordance with scriptural injunctions.

However he was not able to go ahead with his plans of defining a uniform boundary for Shyam Kund. Maharaj Yudhishtir appeared to him in a dream to reveal that the five trees he wanted to uproot for the purpose were in reality the Pandavas. That’s when Goswamiji decided against felling them. The boundary was eventually marked along the contours of these trees, which is why the Shayam Kund is not a perfect shape. 

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