The Lunar Months and Their Festivals

Most households in India live by two calendars at once. The civil calendar governs school terms and tax deadlines; the lunar calendar governs when the family fasts, when a wedding may be fixed and when the lamps go up for Diwali. The second is older, and it follows a logic that is easy to see once someone explains it.

A lunar month, or masa, runs from one new moon to the next, or from one full moon to the next, depending on the region. Each has a name, and each name tells you something about the sky.

How the months got their names

The twelve months are Chaitra, Vaishakha, Jyeshtha, Ashadha, Shravana, Bhadrapada, Ashwin, Kartika, Margashirsha, Pausha, Magha and Phalguna. Each is named after the nakshatra, or lunar mansion, near which the full moon falls that month. The full moon of Chaitra sits close to Chitra, that of Kartika close to Krittika, that of Pausha close to Pushya. The calendar is a record of where the moon is when it is brightest.

Each month is divided into two halves, or pakshas. Shukla paksha is the waxing fortnight, from new moon to full moon; krishna paksha is the waning fortnight. Within each paksha are fifteen tithis, lunar days defined by the angle between sun and moon rather than by sunrise. A festival is fixed to a month, a paksha and a tithi: Ram Navami is Chaitra shukla navami, the ninth lunar day of the bright half of Chaitra.

Two ways of counting

In much of North India the month ends at the full moon; this is the purnimanta system. In Maharashtra, Gujarat and the South it ends at the new moon; this is amanta. The shukla paksha has the same name in both, but the krishna paksha does not. So Janmashtami, the krishna ashtami that follows the full moon of Shravana, is called Bhadrapada krishna ashtami in Varanasi and Shravana krishna ashtami in Pune. Same night, same moon, different label. Families who move between regions often discover this the hard way, and nothing is wrong with either reckoning.

The calendar is not a list of holidays; it is a record of where the moon stands when it is brightest.

Because twelve lunar months fall about eleven days short of a solar year, an extra month, the adhika masa, is inserted roughly every thirty-two and a half months. During an adhika masa many families avoid starting new samskaras such as weddings or griha pravesh, while devotional observance continues. This is why festival dates drift against the civil calendar and then correct themselves.

Where the sun takes over

Not every festival is lunar. Makar Sankranti marks the sun entering sidereal Capricorn, which is why it falls on or near 14 January every year. Vishu, Baisakhi and Puthandu are similarly solar. Knowing which festivals follow the sun and which follow the moon explains most of the confusion people bring to a priest each year.

The months also carry seasonal character. Shravana, in the monsoon, is associated with Shiva worship and vows; Kartika, after the rains, with lamps and the Tulsi vivah; Magha, in winter, with bathing at sacred rivers. These associations grew from agricultural and climatic life as much as from scripture.

If you want to follow the lunar year more closely, begin with a reliable panchang for your own city, since tithis are calculated for local sunrise. Note which system your family uses, amanta or purnimanta, and write it on the first page. When a date seems to disagree with a relative's calendar, check that first; most of the time it is the counting, not the festival, that differs.

Vedic counsel and ritual are traditional and complementary practices — they sit alongside professional medical, legal and financial advice, never as a substitute for it.