Uddhav Kyari, Nandgaon: Where the Bhramar Geet Humbled Uddhav's Pride

Uddhav Kyari, Nandgaon, at a glance

What is Uddhav Kyari?

Uddhav Kyari, also known as Udho-kyari or Kadamba-kyari and as the Uddhav kriya-sthana, is a deeply sacred and historic site in Nandgaon, the hill town of Nanda Baba in Braj. It is revered as the very forest where the famous Uddhav-Gopi Samvad, the dialogue between Krishna's messenger Uddhav and the Gopis, took place, the dialogue immortalised in the Bhramar Geet of the Srimad Bhagavatam. It lies in a quiet, forested spot on the parikrama path of the Nandishwar hill, near the Nand Mahal, the palace of Nanda Baba and Narada Vana. For Nanda Baba's town and its holy places, see our nandgaon up guide and to visit Nandgaon and its leela sites, amathura vrindavan tour packages with Experience My India can plan it.

From the ground (Gurudutt): This is one of the deepest places in all of Braj, though a quiet forest that most visitors miss. Here the great scholar Uddhav came, so sure of his learning, to teach our simple Gopis philosophy; and here those same Gopis, with their pure love for Krishna, humbled all his knowledge, until he begged to be born as a blade of grass in this very forest, just to feel the dust of their feet. I tell this story slowly, under these old trees and I have seen it move grown men to tears. We tell it as the cherished tradition of Braj. Radhe Radhe.

Why Krishna sent Uddhav to the Gopis

The story of Uddhav Kyari begins in Mathura, with Krishna's two loving purposes:

• Krishna's own longing. By the tradition, after Lord Krishna left the villages of Braj for the city of Mathura, to slay the tyrant Kansa and take up his royal duties, he could not forget the boundless love of his foster parents and of the Gopis; and he knew the Gopis were burning in the pain of separation from him.

• Uddhav the wise. Krishna's close friend and cousin Uddhav was a great philosopher, a firm follower of the path of knowledge, the gyan marg and a worshipper of the formless, unmanifest Brahma; and, for all his greatness, he carried a subtle pride in his vast learning.

• The twofold mission. So Krishna sent Uddhav to Nandgaon with a message, both to ease the Gopis' pain and, gently, to humble Uddhav's pride: he was to counsel the Gopis to turn their minds from Krishna's beloved form to meditation on the formless supreme. Uddhav set out, thinking it an easy task to teach philosophy to simple village women; but Krishna knew what awaited him.

The Uddhav-Gopi Samvad: the wise man meets pure love

At this forest in Nandgaon, the wise Uddhav met the Gopis and all his expectation was overturned. He had come prepared to instruct them in the subtle philosophy of the formless God; but he was met instead with the Maha-bhava, the absolute, ultimate height of pure, selfless, transcendent love for Krishna, the Prema-Bhakti, possessed by Shrimati Radharani and the Gopis, a love wholly given to the Lord, never a worldly matter, beyond anything his learning had known. When he spoke to them of the formless Brahma and bade them forget Krishna's form, the Gopis answered him not with argument but with the overwhelming truth of their love and their longing; and the great scholar found his philosophy powerless before it. The radha rani temple barsana of nearby Barsana honours that same Radha whose love confounded the wise. We present this as the cherished belief and tradition of Braj, held with faith and recounted with reverence.

The Bhramar Geet, the Song of the Bee

The dialogue of Uddhav and the Gopis is immortalised as the Bhramar Geet, the Song of the Bee, one of the most beloved passages of the Srimad Bhagavatam:

• The coming of the bee. By the tradition, as Uddhav spoke, a bumblebee, a bhramar, came buzzing among the Gopis; and Shrimati Radharani, in the depth of her love and the sweetness of her mood, addressed the bee as though it were a messenger sent by Krishna, speaking to it in place of answering Uddhav directly.

• The song to the bee. Through her words to the bee, Radharani poured out a response of the highest feeling, by turns tender, sorrowful, brilliant and gently satirical, that revealed the fickleness, as the Gopis saw it, of one who could leave such love and the utter supremacy of their devotion over every cold philosophy; this is the Bhramar Geet, the song of the bee.

• A sublime teaching in love. So the Bhramar Geet is cherished not as a quarrel but as one of the sublimest expressions in all of scripture of the supremacy of pure love over mere knowledge; it is studied and sung by devotees to this day and Uddhav Kyari is its very birthplace. We present this as the cherished tradition of Braj.

The triumph of devotion over intellect

Uddhav Kyari is revered above all as the place of a great spiritual truth: the triumph of pure devotion, bhakti, over dry knowledge, gyan. Here the most learned of philosophers, come to instruct simple cowherd women in the highest wisdom, found that their selfless, loving devotion to the Lord was a height his knowledge could not reach; his every effort to turn them to the formless failed and his intellectual pride was wholly dissolved by the truth of their love. So the site stands, across the ages, as the assurance that the loving devotion of the humblest heart is greater than the vastest learning and that the Lord is won by love before all else; it is one of the dearest teachings of the bhakti tradition and Uddhav Kyari is where it was shown. We present this as the cherished belief and tradition of Braj.

Uddhav's transformation and his prayer

The deepest beauty of the story is the change in Uddhav himself:

• The scholar becomes the student. Astounded by the spiritual height of the Gopis' love, the wise Uddhav set aside his pride and his philosophy and accepted Shrimati Radharani and the Gopis as his own gurus, his spiritual masters; the teacher had come to teach and went away taught, the greatest lesson of his life.

• The prayer to be a blade of grass. So moved was Uddhav by the Gopis' devotion that, by the tradition, he prayed to Lord Krishna that he might be born again, even as a humble blade of grass or a bush or a creeper in this very forest of Braj, so that he might forever receive upon his head the blessed dust of the feet of these Gopis; a prayer cherished as one of the most beautiful in all of scripture.

• The glory of the Gopis' love. That the wisest of the wise should long to be a blade of grass for the dust of the Gopis' feet is the glory of Uddhav Kyari and the measure of the love it witnessed; it is a place to bow the head and the heart. We present this as the cherished tradition of Braj.

What to see today and how to reach

Uddhav Kyari today is a quiet, forested site of several acres on the Nandgaon parikrama:

• The grove and the shrines. The site is a serene, relatively isolated forested area, with an ancient grove of pilu and doongar trees, under which the devotee may sit and remember the Bhramar Geet; within it are a small temple dedicated to Sri Uddhav Ji, the Uddhav temple and the adjacent holy water body, the Uddhav Kunda, which by local tradition is also associated with Visakha Kunda, after Visakha, a chief sakhi of Radha.

• Where it is. Uddhav Kyari is on the parikrama path of the Nandishwar hill in Nandgaon, near the Nand Mahal and Narada Vana, and, by local reckoning, just south of Lalita Kunda; Nandgaon is about 50 km from Mathura and Vrindavan, near Barsana. It is a little off the main path, in the quiet of the forest, so a Braj guide who knows Nandgaon helps you find it.

• Visiting. It is a deeply devotional, contemplative spot, best visited quietly, in the cool of the morning or evening; take the darshan at the Uddhav temple, sit a while in the grove and remember the great teaching of love. Treat the forest, the kund and the shrine with reverence and keep its peace. The nearby Yashoda Kund and the other kunds of Nandgaon are dear too.

See our places to visit in nandgaon guide for the whole of Nandgaon, the yashoda kund nandgaon nearby and our how to commute in vrindavan guide for reaching this side of Braj.

We take guests to Uddhav Kyari and the holy places of Nandgaon, the Nand Bhavan, Yashoda Kund and the kunds and nearby Barsana, the town of Radha and the whole of Braj, in a comfortable vehicle with a Braj-born guide who knows Nandgaon and the deep old stories. A shared day tour starts from around ₹1,499 per person, with darshan free. The braj 84 kos yatra covers the whole of Braj, our mathura vrindavan tour the twin cities and our vrindavan tour package Vrindavan in a day; the lathmar holi nandgaon 2027 guide covers the famous Holi of Nandgaon. Message me on WhatsApp at +91-7302265809 to plan your Nandgaon darshan.

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