Gaṇeśa Caturthī

When it falls

The fourth lunar day (caturthī) of the bright half of Bhādrapada, in late August or September. The festival runs up to ten days, ending with the immersion on Ananta Caturdaśī.

The Phala almanac gives the exact day for your own city; the lunar and solar rules above are what it computes from.

The story

Gaṇeśa is the elephant-headed son of Pārvatī and Śiva, the remover of obstacles, and the god invoked at the start of every undertaking. His mother shaped him from the paste of her own body to guard her door; Śiva, not knowing him, struck off his head, and restored him with the head of the first creature found, an elephant.

Home worship of Gaṇeśa on this day is old, but the public festival is a nineteenth-century creation. In 1893 Lokamānya Tilak turned the household rite into a neighbourhood one in Pune, giving people a lawful reason to gather in large numbers under British rule. The paṇḍāl (festival tent), the ten days of music and the immersion procession all date from then.

Mumbai's Lālbāghchā Rājā, installed since 1934, draws over a million visitors in its ten days; the Ganeshotsav is the city's largest event of the year.

How the day is kept

• A clay image is brought home with its face covered, installed (sthāpanā) with the prāṇa-pratiṣṭhā rite that invites the god into it, and worshipped morning and evening.
• The offering is twenty-one modaka, the steamed rice-flour dumplings filled with coconut and jaggery that are Gaṇeśa's favourite, and dūrvā grass.
• The image stays for one and a half, three, five, seven or ten days, then goes to a river, a tank or the sea with drums and dancing: Gaṇapati Bāppā moryā, pudhcyā varṣī lavkar yā (come again early next year).
• Andhra and Telangana keep it as Vināyaka Cavithi with a reading of the moon story: whoever looks at the moon tonight risks false accusation, so the eyes stay down.

At the table

Modaka first, steamed (ukaḍīce) in Maharashtra and fried elsewhere; undrallu (steamed rice balls) in Telugu homes; kozhukattai in Tamil ones. Coconut and jaggery run through all of them.

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