4-2-3-7 or Seven Circles? ISKCON Youth Preacher Tells Ritviks to Delete Their Lamp-Offering Video

Hare Krishna Mandir Bhadaj taught its Instagram followers to wave the Kartik lamp seven times before each form on the altar. An ISKCON Youth Forum preacher answered that ISKCON’s “4-2-3-7” arati is the one backed by Srila Prabhupada and the Hari-bhakti-vilasa, and asked the temple to delete its video.

AHMEDABAD, India — A short Instagram video on how to offer a lamp during the month of Kartik has drawn a public rebuttal in Ahmedabad. On 1 November 2026 Rupa Govind Das, who describes himself on Instagram as a facilitator of the ISKCON Youth Forum (IYF), posted a reel titled “Which is correct? Correcting @harekrishnamandir_official with Sastric and Srila Prabhupada’s evidence”, answering the lamp-offering instructions of Hare Krishna Mandir Bhadaj, a temple of the Hare Krishna Movement.^[1][2] His on-screen verdict: “Iskcon is correct, 4237 is correct.”^[2]

What Hare Krishna Mandir taught

On 25 October the temple’s Instagram account, which has about 505,000 followers, posted a 53-second reel, “Deepdaan Kaise Kare? | How to Offer Lamp to Krishna | Kartik Damodar Maas”.^[1] In Hindi, the speaker tells viewers to take a clay lamp washed with water and a wick dipped in ghee, and to wave it seven times so as to cover the whole picture of Sri Sri Yashoda-Damodara; those without such a picture can offer the lamp to a photo on their phone. For a full home altar, the instruction is seven times each to Srila Prabhupada, Nityananda Prabhu, Caitanya Mahaprabhu, Radharani, Krishna and Yashoda-Damodara, then to show the lamp to everyone and take its blessing oneself. The video asks viewers to offer a lamp at least once a day throughout Kartik, at any time of day if the evening is not possible, and to sing the Damodarastakam.^[1]

The reply: “Prabhupada and shastra”

Rupa Govind Das’s 2 minute 54 second reply opens with a short clip of a speaker who, according to Akincana Gocara’s translation of the Hindi audio, says that the 4-2-3-7 system is not found in Prabhupada’s books, letters or lectures and calls such practices innovations. Rupa Govind Das then addresses viewers who, he says, were confused because ISKCON offers the lamp in a 4-2-3-7 pattern while “this Prabhuji” says it is wrong and that Prabhupada did not give it.^[2] In the pattern he defends, the lamp is circled four times at the feet, twice at the navel, three times at the face and seven times around the whole form.^[2]

He makes his case in three steps:^[2]

1. Prabhupada’s 1976 letter. He shows Srila Prabhupada’s letter to Nitai of 9 January 1976, which says that the devotees preparing for the Bhakti-sastri examination “require a guidebook for Deity worship, arcana-paddhati, based on Hari-bhakti-Vilasa” and that “all brahmanas will be responsible to learn this book.”^[3]
2. Prabhupada’s summary of the Hari-bhakti-vilasa. He reads Prabhupada’s description of the book’s eighth chapter, which gives “instructions on how to set up incense, light lamps, make offerings, dance, play music”.^[4]
3. The verse. He displays a Sanskrit verse that his slide presents as a quotation from the Skanda Purana in the Hari-bhakti-vilasa (Volume 2, Vilasa 8): catuḥ pāde ca nābhau dve mukhe trīṇi ca sarvataḥ / saptavāraṁ bhaved ārātrikaṁ muni-puṅgava, translated on the slide as “four times to the area of the lotus feet, twice to the region of the navel, three times to the circle of the face, and seven times around all limbs.”^[2]

He closes by asking the temple’s speaker to delete the video, saying it will mislead viewers, and adds:

“Some acharya sent a letter to someone, and on the basis of that letter you have made a whole system. But the acharya also wrote books. … When a doubt comes up about an instruction, one should turn to the acharya. It is not that we are right, that whatever we follow is right.”

Rupa Govind Das, Instagram reel, 1 November 2026 (Akincana Gocara’s translation from Hindi)

Where things stand

As of 10 November, the reply had about 740 likes and 136 comments.^[2] Hare Krishna Mandir Bhadaj had not answered it in any of the reels it posted up to 10 November, the latest of which show its Govardhana-puja darshan, and its 25 October video was still online.^[1]

A note on the sources. Both videos are in Hindi; the quotations above are Akincana Gocara’s translations of automatic transcripts and should be checked against the audio. Akincana could not identify which video the opening clip of the reply comes from: the temple’s 25 October reel gives its own method but does not mention 4-2-3-7. The verse shown in the reply could not be located in the online Sanskrit text of the Hari-bhakti-vilasa’s eighth chapter published by the Gaudiya Grantha Mandira, which may follow a different edition.^[5]

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Sources

Howdy, sankirta

1. Hare Krishna Mandir Bhadaj (@harekrishnamandir_official), “Deepdaan Kaise Kare? | How to Offer Lamp to Krishna | Kartik Damodar Maas”, Instagram, 25 October 2026. instagram.com/reel/De6yKYcN5UN
2. Rupa Govind Das (@rupa_govind_das), “Which is correct? Correcting @harekrishnamandir_official with Sastric and Srila Prabhupada’s evidence”, Instagram, 1 November 2026. instagram.com/reel/DfOzYSUTmLu
3. Srila Prabhupada, letter to Nitai, Bombay, 9 January 1976, as compiled in “Hari-bhakti-vilasa (Letters)”, Vaniquotes. vaniquotes.org/wiki/Hari-bhakti-vilasa_(Letters)
4. Srila Prabhupada, Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, Madhya-lila 1.35, purport, Vedabase. vedabase.io/en/library/cc/madhya/1/35
5. Sanatana Gosvami, Hari-bhakti-vilasa, chapter 8 (Prātararcāsamāpana-vilāsa), Sanskrit text, Gaudiya Grantha Mandira edition, Wisdom Library. wisdomlib.org/hinduism/book/hari-bhakti-vilasa-sanskrit-text/…