Bhakti Yoga Rishikesh
Seekers who sing
A community in Rishikesh, practising love the old-fashioned way.
Some of us came for a week, some have stayed for years. Everyone arrived the same way — curious, a little shy, welcomed warmly.
who we are
It started with a harmonium
Like most good things in Rishikesh, this began with a few friends, a borrowed harmonium and an evening nobody wanted to end.
These days we fill the MVT hall in Upper Tapovan every week — long-time locals, first-time travellers, teachers, students, and at least one person who mainly came for the food. You sit, you sing, and somewhere in the second chorus you stop feeling like a visitor.
Everything is free — the weekly evenings, the October festival, the meal we share afterwards. We do this because we love it, and it shows.
what is bhakti
Love, as a practice
Bhakti is devotion — the oldest and simplest of the yogas. Where other paths start with the body or the breath, bhakti starts with the heart — a way of coming to know yourself and the Divine. And the practices are things anyone can do.
Sing
Kirtan
Songs passed down for centuries, sung call-and-response with harmonium and drum until the room is one voice.
Repeat
Japa
A quiet, personal meditation — a mantra repeated softly on beads, one bead at a time.
Listen
Satsang
Sitting with wisdom — readings from the Gita, honest talks, and questions that actually get answered.
Share
Prasad & seva
Food cooked with care and shared with everyone — and the quiet joy of helping out.
“If one offers Me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, a fruit or water, I will accept it.”
Bhagavad-gita 9.26
our roots
Old roots, open arms
Photo: Vrajacandrika, CC BY 2.0
The practice itself is old — five centuries and more. Kirtan as we sing it grew up in Bengal, where wandering singers taught something disarmingly simple: in noisy times, the easiest doorway to the sacred is a song, repeated together until it opens.
It has been handed along ever since — teacher to student, hall to hall, generation to generation — all the way to this room in Rishikesh. The books and recordings of teachers in that long line are what first brought many of us here.
We hold that inheritance with love and we pass it on the same way. Whoever you are and whatever you believe, there’s a seat beside us. Come as you are — the song meets you there.
the family
Faces you’ll meet
Every one of these people once walked in for the first time.
Reading about bhakti only gets you so far
The real introduction is an evening in the hall. Message us and we’ll tell you what’s on this week.