Breaking the Cart: Shakatasura

On a festive day in Gokul, baby Krishna, lying beneath a heavy cart, kicked it with his tender feet and overturned it, ending the demon hidden within.

There was great joy in the house of Nanda Baba in Gokul. Little Krishna had turned over on his own for the first time, and on that same day his birth star was in the ascendant. Mother Yashoda celebrated the occasion with the utthana festival. The women of the village sang auspicious songs, the brahmins chanted Vedic hymns of blessing, and Yashoda bathed her darling and dressed him in fine clothes and ornaments.

When the child's eyes grew heavy with sleep, she laid him down gently in the shade of a large handcart that stood in the courtyard. The cart was loaded with many pots of brass and clay, full of milk, curd and butter. Then Yashoda became busy welcoming and serving her many guests.

After a while Krishna woke up and began to cry for milk. In the noise of the festival his mother did not hear him. Crying, the baby kicked his tiny reddish feet into the air. At the touch of those tender feet the huge cart turned completely over. Its wheels and axle broke, and all the pots on it shattered and spilled. According to the commentators and the popular tradition, a demon named Shakatasura, sent by Kansa, had entered that cart, and he met his end in that very moment.

Hearing the crash, everyone came running and asked in wonder how it had happened. The small children who had been playing nearby said that the baby had kicked the cart over. The elders could not believe it, for they did not know the divinity of the child. Alarmed, Yashoda lifted him into her arms, asked the brahmins to chant prayers for peace, and lovingly fed him.

This leela teaches that even the lightest touch of the Lord can overturn the heaviest burden and danger. For those who take shelter in him, he himself lightens the load of life.

Source

Shrimad Bhagavatam, Canto 10, ch. 7

Place

Gokul

Lesson

Even the lightest touch of the Lord can overturn the heaviest burden and danger in life.