India GOFestivals of Varanasi
Diwali
On Diwali night Varanasi lights its aarti ghats and temple lanes while families keep the puja at home; the river of lamps people picture is Dev Deepawali, fifteen days later.
📅 6 November 2026
Chhath Puja
For two tides of light, at sunset on the main day and before dawn the next morning, the entire Varanasi riverfront stops being a walkway and becomes standing room, first for the setting sun and then for the rising one.
📅 13 November 2026
Dev Deepawali
Stand on the ghats on the Kartik full-moon evening as earthen lamps are set out in rows along the whole river frontage and floated on the water, turning the stone steps into a continuous line of flame.
📅 21 November 2026
Hanuman Jayanti
The strongest thing attached to Hanuman Jayanti in Varanasi is not the day itself but the Sankat Mochan Sangeet Samaroh, six free nights of classical music inside the Hanuman temple every April, now past its 100th edition.
📅 22 December 2026
Makar Sankranti
Makar Sankranti turns the Varanasi ghats into a bathing day: the sun crosses into Capricorn, Uttarayana begins, and the river steps fill from first light.
📅 14 January 2027
Maha Shivaratri
Kashi Vishwanath stays open through the night for around a million devotees, the Shiv Baraat carries Shiva's wedding party across the old city, and four aartis mark the watches of the night.
📅 6 March 2027
Holi
Kashi starts its Holi five days early: Baba Vishwanath's palanquin in clouds of gulal on Rangbhari Ekadashi, ash from the pyres at Manikarnika the next day, and colour on the ghats on Holi itself.
📅 21 March 2027
Ram Navami
A temple day in Varanasi: the Ramcharitmanas recited at Tulsi Manas, queues building towards Rama's noon birth, ghats as usual. The big gatherings are in Ayodhya and Bhadrachalam.
📅 15 April 2027
Buddha Purnima
The relics kept under the Buddha at Mulagandha Kuti Vihar leave the temple twice a year, and Buddha Purnima is one of the two days.
📅 20 May 2027
Ramnagar Ramlila
Across the Ganga from Varanasi, the town of Ramnagar becomes a month-long, lamplit Ramayana, and the audience walks with the story from one part of town to the next.
📅 14 September 2027
Navratri
In Varanasi each of the nine days has its own goddess and temple, and Navratri becomes a walk through the lanes from shrine to shrine, with pandals at the end and the Ramlila across the river.
📅 30 September 2027
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