Festival Kali, Shyama, Shiva
Kali Puja · Shyama Puja
The new moon of Kartik, the night Bengal worships Kali: the dark mother standing on Shiva, with the sword and the severed head in two hands and the other two giving and reassuring.
Kali Puja · Shyama Puja 2026 falls on Sunday, 8 November, 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
Bengal calendar, computed for Chennai
- Sunday, 8 November 2026
- Thursday, 28 October 2027
- Tuesday, 17 October 2028
Where Kali Puja · Shyama Puja falls on the solar year, and how far the date moves between occurrences.
- 2026: 8 Nov
- 2027: 28 Oct, 11 days earlier
- 2028: 17 Oct, 10 days earlier
The dates, year by year
Bengal calendar, computed for Chennai
What the day is
The new moon of Kartik, the night Bengal worships Kali: the dark mother standing on Shiva, with the sword and the severed head in two hands and the other two giving and reassuring. The puja is done at midnight with red hibiscus and lamps; Dakshineswar and Kalighat and the barir pujo of the old houses keep it through the night, and Tarapith and the cremation-ground shrines keep the fiercest form of it. The songs of Ramprasad and Kamalakanta to the mother belong to this night.
- Deity
- Kali, Shyama, Shiva
- Kind
- Festival Days of celebration: the house is decorated, a feast is cooked and the temple is visited.
Significance
In the Devi Mahatmya, when the goddess fought Raktabija, from every drop of whose blood that touched the earth another demon rose, Kali, who had sprung from her brow in the battle before, spread her tongue across the field and drank the blood before it could fall. Bengal tells what followed: her dance of victory shook the worlds until Shiva lay down in her path, and she stopped with her foot on his chest and her tongue out in shame, which is the image of the household puja. The gentle Dakshina Kali of the Bengali home is credited to the tantric scholar Krishnananda Agamavagisha of Nabadwip, and the eighteenth-century Raja Krishnachandra of Nadia is said to have made the puja general across his lands. Families keep the night for the mother who frightens only what ought to be frightened, death, pride and fear itself, and who holds her children close.
How it is kept
The puja as a household does it, in order. Tick each step as it is done.
Kali Puja · Shyama Puja: how it is kept
Keep ready
- an image or picture of Dakshina Kali
- red jaba flowers, a hundred and eight for the garland
- bel leaves and sindur
- a ghat of water with mango leaves
- earthen lamps, mustard oil and wicks
- candles for the roof and the doorsteps
- fourteen greens and fourteen lamps for the day before
- incense, dhuno and a conch
The steps
0 of 8 done
What is cooked
The day before is for the choddo shaak, fourteen greens cooked together. The bhog of the puja is khichuri, five fried vegetables, labra, chutney, payesh and sweets, with luchi in many houses; in the Shakta families of Bengal the prasad can include fish, or the niramish mangsho, meat cooked without onion or garlic, and traditions vary.
The hour
Clock times for Sunday, 8 November 2026 at Chennai
The Amavasya running at nishita, true midnight, because Kali is worshipped at night. That is a different instant from the pradosha the north reads for Diwali, so the two can carry different dates although they are one night.
The main rite. The Amavasya running at nishita, true midnight, since Kali is worshipped at night; the lamps go up at dusk, and the puja is done around midnight and runs on into the small hours in the old houses.
| Instant | Time | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Pradosha kala | 17:40 to 20:04 | the 2 h 24 min after sunset, the evening worship hour |
| Nishita | 23:53 | true midnight, the midpoint of sunset and the next sunrise |
Sunrise 06:05, sunset 17:40, 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 | Krishna Chaturdasi from previous day 10:48 until 11:28 | then Krishna Amavasai until next day 12:32 |
| Nakshatra | Swati until next day 07:24 | then Vishakha until 2 days later, 09:19 |
| Rahu kaal | 16:13 to 17:40 (1 h 27 min) | the eighth of the daylight left alone for a beginning |
| Yamaganda | 11:53 to 13:20 (1 h 27 min) | the eighth ruled by Yama, also avoided |
| Gulika | 14:46 to 16:13 (1 h 27 min) | the eighth of Saturn’s son; what is done in it is said to repeat |
| Abhijit | 11:29 to 12:16 (0 h 46 min) | the midday muhurta, good for most things |
| Moonrise | 05:03 | moonset 16:51 |
For Sunday, 8 November 2026 at Chennai. A time marked "previous day" or "next day" is on the clock of that day.
The fast
Those who keep it fast through the day and eat after the midnight puja. The offering is khichuri and five fried vegetables and sweets, and in some houses fish or meat, which the Shakta rite allows; traditions vary, and a family follows its own.
What is avoided
The tantric rites of the cremation ground are left to those initiated into them; the household worships the gentle Dakshina form. Loud crackers are best left alone, for the animals and the old, and Kolkata limits them by law.
The name
The same day, in every language that has a word for it
Where the regions differ
Bengal, Assam, Odisha and Mithila keep Kali Puja on the night the rest of India keeps Lakshmi Puja and Diwali, and the lamps go up on the same evening in Bengali houses too. Odisha and parts of Bengal keep the following day for Alakshmi, who is sent out of the house.
In other regions
- North India
- The north keeps the same new moon as Diwali, with the Lakshmi and Ganesha puja at pradosha; Mithila and the Bengali quarters of Varanasi and Delhi keep Kali Puja at midnight as Bengal does.
- Bengal (the dates above)
- Bengal keeps Kali Puja in the homes, in the sarbojanin pandals, with Barasat and Naihati drawing the crowds, and in the great temples of Kalighat, Dakshineswar and Tarapith; many West Bengal families worship Lakshmi in the early evening of the same night before the Kali puja begins.
- Assam
- Assam keeps the same night as Kali Puja and Diwali together, with lamps on every house and the Kali pujas of Guwahati and the Barak Valley running into the small hours.
- Nepal
- Nepal keeps the same night as the Laxmi Puja of Tihar, with lamps on every sill and the bhailo songs going from door to door.
The dates above are the Bengal 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
শুভ কালীপূজাShubho Kalipuja
Where this day is kept
Nearest first from Chennai, with what is recorded about each.
- Maa Cuttack Chandi Temple 1,015 kmOdisha
The gazetteer line for this temple names the day. Cuttack’s own Devi on the Mahanadi bank, whose Durga Puja and Kali Puja behind the silver and gold filigree backdrops are the city’s great nights.
- Kalighat Kali Temple 1,353 kmKolkata, West Bengal
The gazetteer line for this temple names the day. Kali Puja on the Deepavali amavasai and Tuesdays and Saturdays are its days.
- Dakshineswar Kali Temple 1,366 kmKolkata, North 24 Parganas, West Bengal
The gazetteer line for this temple names the day. Kali Puja and Snan Yatra are its days.
- Kankalitala Shakti Peetha 1,419 kmBirbhum, West Bengal
The gazetteer line for this temple names the day. Kali Puja and the Makar Sankranti mela are its days.
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.
- Argala stotram: Jayanti Mangala Kali
- Ya Devi Sarvabhuteshu
- Durga Saptashati (Devi Mahatmyam)
A name without a link is a long reading, read in full from the family’s own copy or at the place of worship; the library prints the shorter prayers.
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.