Narottama Dasa Thakura, also known as Thakura Mahasaya, was a Gaudiya Vaishnava saint who spread Vaishnava bhakti in Odisha and Bengal in India. He was born in 1466 in Gopalpur Pargana, Bangladesh, and was the son of King Krishnananda Datta and Narayani Devi. Narottama Dasa had a strong attraction to Sri Chaitanya from an early age and received a vision of Lord Nityananda, which led him to take a bath in the Padma River and receive pure love of Godhead.
At the age of sixteen, Narottama left home with the intention of going to Jagannath Puri but changed his route upon hearing about the disappearance of Mahaprabhu. He then traveled to Vrindavan, where he took shelter of Sri Jiva Goswami and later received initiation from Lokanath Prabhu. Narottama preached the teachings of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and the Goswamis in West Bengal and organized the first Gaura Purnima festival in Kheturi, where Jahnava Ma, the eternal consort of Nityananda Prabhu, was present.
Narottama maintained himself through madhukari, begging for food from devotees, and preached tirelessly, emphasizing that Vaishnavism should be based on surrender and realization in Krishna consciousness rather than external factors. He made many disciples, including Brahmanas, which caused some controversy among other Brahmanas who criticized him for initiating Brahmanas while being a Kayastha. Narottama departed from this world under the tamarind tree at Prema Ghat by the side of the Padma River in Kheturi.
Narottama Dasa Thakura's life is described in the Prema-vilasa, and his contributions to the Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition were significant. He organized festivals that helped unify the Gaudiya philosophy, with a notable meeting taking place in Kheturi around 1572, fifty years after the disappearance of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu.