Meṣa Saṅkrānti

When it falls

The day the sidereal Sun enters Meṣa (Aries), 13 or 14 April every year. It is the solar new year for every calendar that counts by the Sun.

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

The story

Twelve saṅkrāntis divide the solar year, and this one begins it: the Sun returns to the first sign. The lunar calendars begin their year on the new moon of Caitra a few weeks earlier, and India keeps both.

Half the country keeps today under a local name. It is Baisākhī in Punjab, Vishu in Kerala, Puthāṇḍu in Tamil Nadu, Pohelā Boiśākh in Bengal, Bohāg Bihu in Assam, Panā Saṅkrānti in Odisha, Bikram Samvat new year in Nepal, and Songkran across Thailand, Laos and Cambodia, where it arrived with the Indian calendar.

How the day is kept

• A dawn bath and offerings to the Sun, with water poured from a copper vessel, since the day is the Sun's own.
• In Odisha, Panā Saṅkrānti: a sweet drink (panā) of bel fruit, jaggery and yoghurt is offered and shared, and water drips onto a tulsī plant from a hung pot for the coming heat.
• New account books, new clothes, and a first look at the year through something auspicious, which each region shapes in its own way.

More solar turning points