Makara Sankranti

Makara Sankranti (Makara-Saṅkrānti) — the Hindu festival of the Sun's entry into the sidereal sign Makara (Capricorn), the most honoured of the year's Sankrantis. It falls on 14 or 15 January (one of the few Hindu festivals whose date barely drifts on the Gregorian calendar). Tradition connects this day with Uttarayana — the Sun's turn to the north — and with the turn toward light, though the astronomical solstice, because of precession, falls on 21-22 December.

Place in the system

The festival of Makara Sankranti is one of the oldest Hindu festivals, tied to the solar rather than the lunar calendar. Each year the Sun enters the sidereal sign of Makara (Capricorn) on 14 or 15 January.

"Sankranti" in the Hindu tradition is the moment the Sun crosses from one zodiac sign into another. There are 12 Sankrantis a year, one per month, but Makara Sankranti is the most honoured of them: it opens Uttarayana, the Sun's northward path. The Hindu solar new year begins not here but with Mesha Sankranti in mid-April.

Makara Sankranti is known under different names in different regions of India: Pongal (Tamil Nadu), Magh Bihu (Assam), Uttarayan (Gujarat), Khichdi (northern India); the day before, as a separate festival, Punjab observes Lohri.

Practical meaning

Makara Sankranti is a favourable time for cleansing, for beginning a new cycle, for charity. Tradition connects this day with clearing the past year's burdens and entering the new one with a clear mind.

The Makara Sankranti background works through the solar turn. The Sun enters Capricorn, and tradition reads this entry as a turn toward light.

In Indian folk practice Makara Sankranti is a harvest festival, an exchange of sweets (til-laddu — sweets of sesame and sugar), and charity. In many regions it is customary to fly kites on this day.

In daily practice

Makara Sankranti is a day of new beginnings. It is a good day to carry out a rite of purification — a bath (snan), prayer, charity — and to enter the new cycle with a clear intention.

Makara Sankranti also suits offerings: a gift to a temple, feeding those in need, exchanging sweets with loved ones.

Makara Sankranti also suits a practice of gratitude: for the harvest, for the light, for the year that has passed. Gratitude here is a way of crossing into the new cycle.

How much this day is yours is refined by Tara Bala. Makara Sankranti sets a background of renewal, and the personal layer shows how far it matches your life today.