The Kashi Festival Calendar — a City That Keeps Every Tithi

Six observances shape the pilgrim's year in Kashi. The dates below are checked against the panchang — not copied from listicles — and each links to our detailed page where one exists.

Lunar dates shift each year with the panchang. We update this page every year, and reconfirm the tithi before any booking we take.

For Shiva: Sawan and Mahashivratri are the two poles of the Shaiva year. Sawan gives you a whole month — four Somwars and the best season for Rudrabhishek — while Mahashivratri is a single, sleepless night when the queue itself becomes the vrat. On Rangbhari Ekadashi, in the days after Mahashivratri, Kashi celebrates Baba bringing Mata Parvati home: gulal rises over the temple chowk and Holi begins in Kashi alone, days before the rest of the country.

For the Ganga: Dev Deepawali is the river's own festival — every ghat lit with diyas on Kartik Purnima, best seen from a boat reserved weeks ahead. Makar Sankranti is its quieter winter counterpart: a dawn snan when Uttarayan begins, khichdi and til given on the ghats.

For Annapurna: On Annakut (Kartik Shukla Pratipada), the Annapurna temple beside Kashi Vishwanath lays the chhappan bhog before the Devi, and her golden vigraha — shown only in the few days from Dhanteras to Annakut — receives darshan. An old teaching of Kashi sits in this pairing — Vishweshwar grants moksha, Annapurna grants the meal — and on no day is it more visible.

Every festival here shares one truth: the city fills before the date, not on it. Hotels near the temple and boats on the river are spoken for weeks ahead of each of these days. If your heart is set on a tithi, write to us when your dates firm up — early costs nothing and loses nothing.