Festival Ananta, Vishnu, Ganesha
Anant Chaturdashi
The fourteenth day of the bright fortnight of Bhadrapada, when Vishnu as Ananta is worshipped and a fourteen-knot thread is tied on the arm for the year.
Anant Chaturdashi 2027 falls on Tuesday, 14 September, computed for Chennai.
Latitude, longitude and time zone 13.08, 80.27
Asia/Kolkata · UTC+5:30
The date of a festival depends on the place.
Read more Show less
A tithi that ends at dusk in Chennai can still be running at dusk a thousand kilometres west, which moves the day. Sunrise and sunset here are computed for the place above.
When it falls next
North India calendar, computed for Chennai
- Tuesday, 14 September 2027
- Saturday, 2 September 2028
- Friday, 21 September 2029
Where Anant Chaturdashi falls on the solar year, and how far the date moves between occurrences.
- 2027: 14 Sep
- 2028: 2 Sep, 11 days earlier
- 2029: 21 Sep, 18 days later
The dates, year by year
North India calendar, computed for Chennai
What the day is
The fourteenth day of the bright fortnight of Bhadrapada, when Vishnu as Ananta is worshipped and a fourteen-knot thread is tied on the arm for the year. It is also the last day of the ten-day Ganesha festival: the largest idols go through the streets to the sea or the river and are immersed through the night.
- Deity
- Ananta, Vishnu, Ganesha
- Kind
- Festival Days of celebration: the house is decorated, a feast is cooked and the temple is visited.
Significance
The katha of the day is of Sushila, who tied the Ananta thread on her arm and prospered, and of her husband Kaundinya, who took it for a charm and threw it in the fire, lost everything, and wandered the forest until Vishnu showed himself as Ananta and forgave him; Krishna is said to have told the exiled Yudhishthira to keep the same vow. The fourteen knots of the thread stand for the fourteen worlds that Ananta, the endless, holds up, and those who take the vow whole keep it for fourteen years and close it with an udyapan. In Bihar and eastern Uttar Pradesh the household puja has its own small drama: the thread is laid in a bowl of milk that stands for the ocean of milk and stirred with a cucumber, and the family asks one another what they are searching for until the answer comes, Ananta himself. The same afternoon the pandal Ganeshas go to the water, so a family may tie the thread at noon and walk in the visarjan by night.
How it is kept
The puja as a household does it, in order. Tick each step as it is done.
Anant Chaturdashi: how it is kept
Keep ready
- an image of Vishnu, or of Vishnu on Shesha
- kusha grass for the Shesha
- cotton or silk thread with haldi and kumkum
- a bowl of milk, curd or panchamrit
- a cucumber
- yellow flowers and tulsi leaves
- roli, chandan and akshat
- a ghee lamp
- fourteen puas or puris and fruit for the bhog
The steps
0 of 9 done
What is cooked
The north makes meethe pue of wheat flour and gur, meethi puri, kheer and fruit for the one meal of the vrat, cooked without salt in the strict form, and the fourteen puas go first to the god. Maharashtra closes the Ganeshotsav with modak and the last naivedya before the visarjan, and the Telugu country offers fourteen kinds of fruit and fourteen rotis under the Ananta Padmanabha Vratam.
The hour
Clock times for Tuesday, 14 September 2027 at Chennai
Shukla Chaturdashi at sunrise; the Ananta vrat puja is at midday and the visarjan processions run from the afternoon into the night.
The main rite. Shukla Chaturdashi holding the sunrise; the Ananta puja and the tying of the thread are done at madhyahna, and the Ganesha processions set out in the afternoon and run into the night.
| Instant | Time | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Sunrise | 05:58 | the udaya tithi, the tithi running as the sun comes up |
| Madhyahna | 12:05 | midday, the midpoint of sunrise and sunset |
Sunrise 05:58, sunset 18:11, UTC+5.5. These are the instants the rule is read at, not the temple's own puja times, which every temple prints for itself.
The day itself
| What | When | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Tithi | Shukla Chaturdasi from 00:40 until next day 02:49 | then Shukla Pournami until 2 days later, 04:34 |
| Nakshatra | Dhanishta until 08:59 | then Shatabhisha until next day 11:33 |
| Rahu kaal | 15:08 to 16:39 (1 h 32 min) | the eighth of the daylight left alone for a beginning |
| Yamaganda | 09:01 to 10:33 (1 h 32 min) | the eighth ruled by Yama, also avoided |
| Gulika | 12:05 to 13:36 (1 h 32 min) | the eighth of Saturn’s son; what is done in it is said to repeat |
| Abhijit | 11:40 to 12:29 (0 h 49 min) | the midday muhurta, good for most things |
| Moonrise | 17:08 | moonset next day 05:15 |
For Tuesday, 14 September 2027 at Chennai. A time marked "previous day" or "next day" is on the clock of that day.
The fast
Those keeping the vrat fast until the puja and then eat once, avoiding salt in the strict form. The Jains keep the same day as the last of Paryushana, with Kshamavani the day after.
What is avoided
Salt, onion and garlic are left out of the one meal in the strict vrat, and the thread, once tied, is not pulled off in anger or thrown away; it goes to flowing water when its time is done. The Ganesha immersion is best made in a tank or an artificial pond rather than in a river a town drinks from.
The name
The same day, in every language that has a word for it
Where the regions differ
Mumbai's visarjan is the public face of the day; the Ananta vrat is kept in Odisha, Maharashtra and the Telugu country under the name Ananta Padmanabha Vratam.
In other regions
- Telugu
- The Telugu country keeps the Ananta Padmanabha Vratam with the fourteen-knot thread, and Hyderabad's Khairatabad Ganesha goes into Hussain Sagar.
- Kannada
- Karnataka keeps the Ananta Padmanabha Vrata in many homes, with the thread and the fourteen offerings.
- North India (the dates above)
- Bihar and eastern Uttar Pradesh keep the Ananta vrat with the milk bowl and the cucumber and the thread on the arm; the ten-day Ganesha pandals of Delhi and the Hindi belt go to the Yamuna, the Ganga and the town tanks the same evening.
- Maharashtra
- Mumbai and Pune's visarjan is the public face of the day, with Lalbaug and Dagdusheth leading processions that run through the night, and many Marathi homes keep the Ananta vrat too.
The dates above are the North India reckoning, because that is the calendar this key belongs to. Switch the tradition on the calendar page to see how another one dates the same day.
Greeting
What is said to family and friends on the day
अनंत चतुर्दशी की हार्दिक शुभकामनाएंAnant Chaturdashi ki hardik shubhkamnayein
Where this day is kept
Nearest first from Chennai, with what is recorded about each.
- Mumbai, Maharashtra
The entry for this day names Mumbai, and it is a temple of Ganesha. Mumbai's visarjan is the public face of the day
Temples of Vishnu and Ganesha near you
Not recorded for this day in particular: the nearest temples of the day's own gods, for a reader whose own temple is not listed above.
- Chennai, Tamil Nadu · Venkatakrishnan (Parthasarathy) with the arrow scars on his face
- Chennai, Tamil Nadu · The eight forms of Lakshmi in shrines on four floors, facing the sea
- Chennai, Tamil Nadu · Adhivyadhihara Bhaktha Anjaneyar, thirty-two feet tall from a single block of granite
- Chennai, Tamil Nadu · Neervanna Perumal below and Ranganathar on the hill, in four postures
Your family's own temple comes first, and its calendar is the one that decides.
Read more Show less
A temple is listed here only where the gazetteer's own line names this day, or where this day's own entry names the town, or where the day belongs to the ancestors or the nagas and the temple is recorded for that rite. Where neither table says anything, nothing is listed as kept for the day; where fewer than three are, the nearest temples of the day's own gods are added under a heading of their own.
Mantras
The prayers said with the day. Each opens with its words and meaning.
Every date here is computed from the Sun and Moon for the place entered, by the rule printed beside it.
Read more Show less
A printed panchangam can differ by a day where an almanac reads a tithi at a different instant, and a family's own custom always comes first. Where the practice genuinely varies, the text says so rather than choosing for you.