Festival Ananta Padmanabha, Vishnu, Ganesha
Anantha Chaturdashi · Ganesh nimajjanam
The fourteenth day of the bright fortnight of Bhadrapada, when the Ananta Padmanabha Vratam is kept for Vishnu as Ananta and a fourteen-knot thread is tied on the wrist.
Anantha Chaturdashi · Ganesh nimajjanam 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.
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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
Telugu calendar, computed for Chennai
- Tuesday, 14 September 2027
- Saturday, 2 September 2028
- Friday, 21 September 2029
Where Anantha Chaturdashi · Ganesh nimajjanam 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
Telugu calendar, computed for Chennai
What the day is
The fourteenth day of the bright fortnight of Bhadrapada, when the Ananta Padmanabha Vratam is kept for Vishnu as Ananta and a fourteen-knot thread is tied on the wrist. It is also the last day of the Ganesha festival, when the largest idols are taken through the streets to the water and immersed.
- Deity
- Ananta Padmanabha, Vishnu, Ganesha
- Kind
- Festival Days of celebration: the house is decorated, a feast is cooked and the temple is visited.
Significance
The story read at the vratam is of Sushila and her husband Kaundinya: she kept the Ananta vow and the house prospered, he took the thread on her arm for a charm and threw it in the fire, lost everything, and wandered until Ananta himself showed him the way back. Krishna is said to have given the same vow to Yudhishthira in the exile as the way to recover what the Pandavas had lost, and so it is kept for the return of lost fortune and for the family's continuity. Many Telugu families have kept it for generations as a vow handed down, taking it up for fourteen years at a time, and the fourteen knots of the thread stand for the fourteen worlds that Vishnu as Ananta holds together. The same afternoon the Ganesha of the street pandal, kept since Chavithi, is carried to the water, and in Hyderabad the whole city follows the procession to the Hussain Sagar.
How it is kept
The puja as a household does it, in order. Tick each step as it is done.
Anantha Chaturdashi · Ganesh nimajjanam: how it is kept
Keep ready
- a kalasam with water, mango leaves and a coconut
- darbha grass for the Ananta serpent
- a new fourteen-knot thread dyed in turmeric
- rice for the plank
- tulasi and flowers
- turmeric, kumkum and akshintalu
- fourteen kinds of fruit
- the Ananta Vratha Katha
- betel leaves and dakshina for the vayanam
The steps
0 of 8 done
What is cooked
The naivedyam is counted in fourteens: fourteen kinds of fruit and fourteen of each sweet made. Telugu homes commonly make poornalu, garelu, pulihora and payasam, and Kannada homes that keep the vratam make obbattu and payasa; the strict take their one meal after the puja without salt. Maharashtra's fourteen puris are the same count in another kitchen.
The hour
Clock times for Tuesday, 14 September 2027 at Chennai
Shukla Chaturdashi at sunrise; the vratam is done at midday and the nimajjanam procession goes on through the afternoon and night.
The main rite. Bhadrapada Shukla Chaturdashi at sunrise. The vratam puja is done at midday, and the nimajjanam procession goes on from the afternoon through 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 vratam fast until the puja and eat one meal after it, avoiding salt in the strict form. Fourteen kinds of fruit and fourteen rotis are offered.
What is avoided
The thread, once tied, is not torn off in anger or thrown away carelessly, which is the whole lesson of Kaundinya's story; it is worn until the next year and then put into water. Salt is left out of the one meal in the strict form.
The name
The same day, in every language that has a word for it
Where the regions differ
The Ananta vratam is strongest in Andhra, Telangana and Maharashtra; the immersion is the public face of the day everywhere that keeps a ten-day Ganesha festival.
In other regions
- Telugu (the dates above)
- Andhra and Telangana keep the Ananta Padmanabha vratam in the families that have inherited it, and the day is also the great nimajjanam: Hyderabad's Khairatabad Ganesha goes into the Hussain Sagar, and the Balapur laddu is auctioned before its Ganesha sets out.
- Kannada
- Karnataka keeps the Ananta vratam in Madhva and Smarta homes with the fourteen-knot anantana dara; most Kannada household Ganeshas have gone to the water on an earlier day, and the large public ones go today.
- North India
- The north keeps Anant Chaturdashi with the fourteen-knot anant sutra, and for the Digambara Jains it closes the ten days of Das Lakshana.
- Maharashtra
- Maharashtra's ten-day Ganeshotsav ends today, with the great mandal Ganeshas of Mumbai and Pune taken to the sea and the rivers through the night.
The dates above are the Telugu 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.
Where this day is kept
Nearest first from Chennai, with what is recorded about each.
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.
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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.
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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.