One page on gaudiyahistory.iskcondesiretree.com is titled "Disappearance Day of Shri Purushottama Das Thakura" - yet nowhere in that page, or in any other source consulted for this site, is an actual date, tithi, or place given for his disappearance. That gap is reported here honestly rather than papered over: Purushottama Dasa Thakura's death is simply not recorded in the material available. What is recorded, in unusual detail for a devotee this far from the center of the story, is what happened to his family, his disciples, and the Deities he worshiped in the generations afterward.
| Detail | Description |
|---|---|
| Disappearance date and place | Not recorded in the sources consulted for this page |
| Principal disciples | Madhavacharya, Yadavacharya, Devakinandana Dasa |
| Literary legacy | A verse of homage by his disciple Devakinandana Dasa, in the work Vaishnava-vandana |
| Deity | Pranavallabha (Radha-Krishna), installed by Purushottama Thakura's family |
| Deity's later homes | Beledanga to Sukhasagara to Sahebdanga Berigram to Chandudegrama to Bodhakhana to, by 1950, Jadavpur |
Disciples Who Married Into Nityananda's Own Family #
Purushottama Thakura is remembered as having three principal disciples, all born into brahmana families: Madhavacharya, Yadavacharya, and Devakinandana Dasa. Madhavacharya - also called Madhava Chattopadhyaya, of Jirat in the Hooghly district - went on to marry Ganga Devi, Nityananda Prabhu's own daughter, tying Purushottama Thakura's spiritual family directly into Nityananda's household by marriage. Devakinandana Dasa, meanwhile, became a writer, composing Vaishnava-vandana, a work of homage to the Vaishnavas of his own line. One verse from it survives in the biographical record: "I worship Sadashiva Kaviraj with great attentiveness. He was constantly intoxicated with love and had no external consciousness... I bow down to my worshipable Lord, Purushottam Thakur. Who can list his incomparable qualities? He was merciful to those who were devoid of virtue, displaying the natural power of his compassion. When only seven years old, he was so intoxicated with love for Krishna that he danced in a way that enchanted the entire world." This is the closest thing to an eyewitness-style memory of Purushottama Thakura that has survived - written not by Purushottama Thakura himself, but by his own disciple, of him.
A Family Line That Continued for Generations #
Purushottama Thakura's son, Kanu Thakura, grew into a widely respected devotee in his own right, eventually establishing his own shripat, or seat of worship, at Bodhakhana in the Jessore district, after (by one account) the ankle bell that fell from his foot while he danced in kirtana in Vrindavana was found there. According to Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura's Anubhasya, most of Kanu Thakura's own disciplic descendants eventually settled in the village of Gadabeta, on the river Silavati, in the Midnapore district - a family and disciplic line that Gaudiya Vaishnavas were still able to trace in the twentieth century, generations after Purushottama Thakura's own lifetime.
A Deity That Kept Having to Move #
Perhaps the most vivid part of this family's later story is the Deity of Radha-Krishna, known as Pranavallabha, that Purushottama Thakura's family worshiped. It was first installed at Beledanga village; when that temple was destroyed, the Deity was moved to Sukhasagara, where Purushottama Thakura himself is said to have sometimes lived, between the Chakdaha and Simurali railway stations. When the Ganges swallowed that site too, the Deity moved again, this time together with a Deity belonging to Jahnava-devi herself, to Sahebdanga Berigram. When that place was also lost, the Deity moved once more, about three or four miles, to the village of Chandudegrama. Kanu Thakura's own line later carried a related Deity, Pranavallabha, to Bodhakhana, where it remained until 1950, when political upheaval following Partition forced its move to Jadavpur Ghospada, in the Twenty-Four Parganas district, to the house of Gaurahari Goswami, a descendant of Kanu Thakura still serving the Deity generations later.
Read together, these details - a family repeatedly rebuilding a shrine as rivers and history took it away, a disciple's line still findable centuries afterward, a Deity still being worshiped by a direct descendant as recently as 1950 - are what remain of a devotee whose own death was never recorded, but whose absorption in the service of Nityananda Prabhu, and the family and Deity worship he left behind, plainly outlasted him by a very long time.