Vināyaka Caturthī is the year's principal Gaṇeśa festival, kept on Bhādrapada Śukla Caturthī. A clay image of Gaṇeśa is brought home, installed and worshipped for one to eleven days, and then immersed. The Śiva Purāṇa tells how Pārvatī shaped him from turmeric paste, how Śiva revived him with an elephant's head, and how he was made lord of the gaṇas, to be worshipped before every undertaking. It is also the one night of the year when looking at the moon is avoided. How the day is fixed: The festival is kept on the day when Bhādrapada Śukla Caturthī prevails at local Madhyāhna, the midday period. The pūjā itself is done in that midday window, avoiding Rāhu kālam, Yamagaṇḍam and Guḷikai. Keep in mind: Because the test is made at local midday, the tithi can fall on different civil days in different places. This is a Śukla-pakṣa festival that comes once a year, unlike the monthly Caturthīs. This year: The 2026 date shown here is worked out from sunrise at the place you chose, so in another city the same day can fall a day earlier or later. Installation and pūjā: The mūrti is bathed, dressed and worshipped with durvā grass, and modaka is offered as naivedya. Many households use the twenty-one leaves of the Ekaviṃśati patra pūjā. Immersion: Depending on family custom the image stays for one and a half, three, five, seven or the full ten days. It is then carried in procession and immersed in a river, tank or the sea. Worth remembering: On monthly Sankashti Caturthī the fast is broken only after seeing the moon, but on this night the moon is avoided, because Gaṇeśa cursed Candra for mocking him. Anyone who sees it by mistake listens to the Syamantaka story of Kṛṣṇa, and households keeping ten days bid farewell on Ananta Caturdaśī, which Telugu country calls Vināyaka Nimajjanam. How long the image stays, which leaves and sweets are offered and where it is immersed all follow family and regional custom. The large public pandals are a comparatively recent form, begun by Bal Gangadhar Tilak in Mahārāṣṭra in 1893 to gather people under colonial rule, while household worship is far older. Whatever the scale, the surest guide is the way the elders of one's own house have kept the day.
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