Festival in India: Basant Panchami

Basant Panchami (Vasant Panchmi) is an Indian festival that comes on the fifth day of bright half of lunar month Magh according to Indian lunar calendar. Basant Panchami is observed as Saraswati Puja in several parts of India, especially in West Bengal.

Basant means spring in sanskrit and Panchami refers to the fifth day of a lunar fortnight. Hence Basant Panchami (Vasant Panchmi) means fifth day of a lunar fortnight in spring season. As lunar calendar is different from the solar calendar, Basant Panchami does not fall in the same solar day every year. Normally it comes between January 20 to February 10.

Basant Panchami will be celebrated in India this year on January 20, 2010. This festival of India indicates that winter season has been counting its last days and spring season is about to come.

Update: Basant Panchmi 2012

2012 Basant Panchami will fall on January 28 this year, 2011. Large numbers of marriages will occur in India on that day. This is counted as one of the most auspicious day (Abujh muhurat) in Indian astrology. Most of the marriage lawns and hotels are already booked for marriage ceremonies and celebrations.

As I have mentioned above, Vasant Panchmi is a day of Saraswati Puja. Saraswati is the goddess of knowledge and wisdom in India. Hindu, Jain and Buddh all worship Devi Saraswati as goddess of knowledge. She is also the godess of speech and music. In true sense, she is worshipped by all old Indian religions.

Devi Saraswati has many names such as Shree, Bagdevi, Binapani (Veenapani), Sharda etc. She is all white. Her clothes are white and she is seated on a white lotus. Her vehicle is a white swan. She has a Veena (An Indian musical instrument similar to guitar) in her hands.

Basant Panchami is also a day of Devi Saraswati. All ancient Indian religions of India worship Devi Saraswati on the day of Vasant Panchmi. Especially students and academicians worship her.

Saraswati Puja, festival in India, starts on Vasant Panchmi, the fifth bright day of lunar magh and ends on Saptami, the seventh day of bright fortnight of Magh.

Kolkata worships Devi Saraswati with great enthusiasm along with entire West Bengal. There are Puja pandals every where in Kolkata and other parts of Bengal to worship Saraswati. The goddess is also referred as "Maa" (Mother goddess) in West Bengal.

Bengalis prepare idols of Saraswati with clay and worship the idol during Saraswati Puja. These clay idols are drawn in a river or pond after the end of the ceremony.

People, not only in Bengal but all over the world observe Saraswati Pooja. The goddess is observed and worshiped even in the US. Video follows.

Basant Panchami is one of the most auspicious day (Abujh muhurat) of Jain and Hindu Panchang. Large number of marriages occurred in India on this very auspicious day. Indians believe that there are good and bad days and time according to Indian or Hindu astrology. However, there are some festival days in India which referred as all auspicious.

Akshay Tritiya or Akha Teej, Basant Panchami, Dhan Teras, Vijaya dasami or Dashahara, Navratri, (Grand Festivals of India) are those days. It is not necessary to ask for any shubh Muhurat in these days. One can do any auspicious work such as marriage, Griha Pravesh (Inauguration of a house) or start a business or industry in these auspicious days without asking for any Shubh Muhurat from an astrologer.

Large number of auspicious events, therefore, organized on the day of Vasant Panchmi, the Indian festival day.