Festival · Shiva and Murugan

Karthigai Deepam

The Tamil festival of lamps, when every home is lit with rows of clay lamps and the Maha Deepam is lit on the summit of the Arunachala hill at Tiruvannamalai, for Lord Shiva as the endless column of fire.

Karthigai Deepam 2026
Tuesday 24 November 2026
New Delhi

For New Delhi, Tuesday 24 November 2026

Sunrise
6:51 am
Sunset
5:25 pm
Moonrise
5:01 pm
Moonset
Not this day

Worked out for your city. Panchangs can differ by a minute or so.

Full panchang for this day →

How it is kept

Customs vary by region and family

  • Light rows of clay lamps (agal vilakku) at dusk
  • Watch or visit the Maha Deepam at Tiruvannamalai
  • Worship Lord Shiva and Lord Murugan in the evening
Shiva, his mantra and the Jyotirlingas →

What it remembers

Karthigai Deepam is the Tamil festival of lamps, kept in the Tamil month of Karthigai on the day the Krittika nakshatra holds. At dusk every home is lit with rows of small clay lamps, agal vilakku, and at Tiruvannamalai a great flame is lit on the summit of the Arunachala hill, for Lord Shiva, who once appeared as a column of fire without end. The day belongs to Lord Murugan too, after the six Krittikas who nursed him. In Kerala the same star day is Thrikarthika, and Telugu families light their Karthika Deepam on the full moon of Karthika.

The fire without end

The Shiva Purana tells that Lord Brahma and Lord Vishnu once quarrelled over which of them was the greater. Between them a pillar of fire blazed up, its top and its foot out of sight. Brahma became a swan and flew upward to find the top; Vishnu became a boar and dug down to find the base. Neither reached an end, and both knew Lord Shiva, shining in the flame, as the one without beginning or end. At Tiruvannamalai that fire is said to have settled as the hill of Arunachala, and every lamp lit on this night is a small form of it.

The six Krittikas

Lord Murugan was born, the story goes, from six sparks of fire that came from Lord Shiva’s third eye. They were carried to the Saravana, a pond of reeds, where they became six baby boys, and six sisters, the Krittikas, nursed and raised them. On this day, many tell, Goddess Parvati gathered the six into her arms and they became one child with six faces. The Krittikas were set in the sky as the stars of the Pleiades, the Krittika nakshatra on which this festival falls.

Parvati, half of Shiva

At Tiruvannamalai it is told that Goddess Parvati kept a long penance there and overcame the buffalo demon Mahishasura. Then Lord Shiva appeared to her as a flame on Arunachala, and she merged into it, taking her place as the left half of his body. That is Ardhanarishvara, Shiva who is half Parvati, and the temple brings this form out before its flagstaff just before the Maha Deepam is lit on the hill.

Lamps in the oldest Tamil poems

Karthigai Deepam is among the oldest festivals of the Tamil country. Poems of the Sangam age, among them verses by the poet Avvaiyar, speak of the lamps of Karthigai, so the custom of lighting up a home on this night goes back to the early centuries of the common era.

Lighting the lamps at home

The lamps are lit at dusk, when the Krittika star holds, and many homes light them on the evening before and the evening after as well. Customs differ from family to family; follow your own where they differ.

  1. On the day before, clean the house and wash the lamps, old and new, so they are ready to fill.
  2. On the evening of Bharani, the star just before Krittika, set a few lamps at the entrance, as many families do.
  3. On the day itself, many keep a fast, some only until the lamps are lit; follow your family’s custom and your health. Draw a kolam at the doorway and hang mango leaves over it.
  4. Prepare the naivedyam: pori urundai, balls of puffed rice and jaggery, with appam, adai or whatever your family makes for the day.
  5. At dusk, light the lamp in your home shrine first, worship Lord Shiva and Lord Murugan with flowers, and offer the naivedyam.
  6. Then light the agal vilakku and set them in rows on the threshold, the steps, the windowsills and the walls, with one at the door of every room.
  7. Keep the lamps away from curtains and out of children’s reach, and never leave them burning unwatched.

What you need

  • Agal vilakku, small clay lamps, enough to make rows
  • Sesame oil or ghee, and cotton wicks
  • Kolam powder, and mango leaves for the door
  • Puffed rice and jaggery for pori urundai
  • Flowers for the shrine

Across India

Tiruvannamalai, Tamil Nadu

The ten-day festival at the Arunachaleswarar temple, the shrine of Lord Shiva as fire, opens with the hoisting of the temple flag. On the great day the Bharani Deepam is lit inside the temple before dawn, and at dusk the Maha Deepam blazes up from a huge cauldron of ghee on the summit of the hill, seen for miles around. Lakhs of pilgrims come to watch, and many walk barefoot around the hill, the 14-kilometre girivalam.

Across Tamil Nadu

Every house is lit at dusk with rows of agal vilakku on the doorstep, the walls and the windows, a kolam is drawn at the door, and pori urundai and appam are made as offerings. Murugan temples keep the day too, for the Krittikas who raised him.

Kerala

Thrikarthika falls on the Karthika star in the Malayalam month of Vrischikam and is kept above all for Goddess Parvati and the Devi of each local temple. At dusk homes set small clay lamps on the steps, the courtyard and the walls, some on banana stems decked with tender coconut leaves, and at Kumaranalloor near Kottayam the evening of lamps, Karthika Vilakku, is the great festival of the year.

Andhra Pradesh and Telangana

Telugu families light their Karthika Deepam on Karthika Pournami, the full moon of the lunar month of Karthika, the high point of a month of lamps at Shiva temples. Many light a single lamp of 365 wicks, one for each day of the year, and Shiva temples such as Srisailam hold the Jwala Thoranam, an arch of fire.

Sri Lanka and the Tamil diaspora

Tamil Hindus in Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Singapore and far beyond light rows of lamps at their homes and temples. Abroad the date can move by a day with the time zone, as it does in the USA and Canada in 2026, so check with your local temple.

When it falls

The day the Krittika nakshatra holds at sunset in the Tamil month of Karthigai, while the Sun is in Vrischika (Scorpio), or holds at sunrise when it passes between two sunsets. It often falls on Kartik Purnima.

These are the usual rules. A few days can differ by a day in your tradition, so check with your temple.

Karthigai Deepam in the coming years

New Delhi, India time

  1. 2026Tuesday 24 November 2026
  2. 2027Sunday 12 December 2027
  3. 2028Friday 1 December 2028

Questions

When is Karthigai Deepam in 2026?

Tuesday 24 November 2026, in New Delhi. In a few places it can fall a day apart, so the date above is worked out for your city.

When does Karthigai Deepam fall?

The day the Krittika nakshatra holds at sunset in the Tamil month of Karthigai, while the Sun is in Vrischika (Scorpio), or holds at sunrise when it passes between two sunsets. It often falls on Kartik Purnima.

How is Karthigai Deepam kept?

Families light rows of clay lamps (agal vilakku) at dusk, watch or visit the Maha Deepam at Tiruvannamalai and worship Lord Shiva and Lord Murugan in the evening. Customs vary by region and family.

Who is honoured on Karthigai Deepam?

Shiva and Murugan. The Tamil festival of lamps, when every home is lit with rows of clay lamps and the Maha Deepam is lit on the summit of the Arunachala hill at Tiruvannamalai, for Lord Shiva as the endless column of fire.

Why is Karthigai Deepam celebrated?

For Lord Shiva above all: the lamps recall the night he appeared to Lord Brahma and Lord Vishnu as a pillar of fire with no end, and the great flame on Arunachala stands for that fire. The day is also Lord Murugan’s, after the six Krittikas who nursed him. Every lamp is lit to drive darkness from the home and to bring good fortune in.

What is the Maha Deepam at Tiruvannamalai?

The great flame lit at dusk on the summit of Arunachala, the hill behind the Arunachaleswarar temple, on the last day of the temple’s ten-day Karthigai festival. Its fire comes from the Bharani Deepam lit in the temple that morning, it burns in a huge cauldron of ghee, and it can be seen for miles. It is kept burning for days afterwards.

What is the Bharani Deepam?

The lamp lit before dawn inside the Tiruvannamalai temple, while Bharani, the star before Krittika, still holds. From a single flame five lamps are lit, for the five elements that come from one source, and the flame is kept for the Maha Deepam that evening. In most years it falls on the morning of the same day.

Is Karthigai Deepam the same as Kartik Purnima?

Not quite, though they often fall together. Karthigai Deepam is set by a star: the day Krittika holds in the Tamil solar month of Karthigai. Kartik Purnima is set by the moon: the full moon of the lunar month of Kartika. The two often meet, as they do on Tuesday 24 November 2026, but they can drift apart: in 2025 Kartik Purnima fell on 5 November and Karthigai Deepam on 4 December.

Are Thrikarthika and the Telugu Karthika Deepam the same festival?

They are close cousins. Kerala’s Thrikarthika is kept on the same star, Karthika, in the same solar month, so it usually falls on the same day, with lamps at dusk and the worship of Devi. Telugu families keep Karthika Deepam on Karthika Pournami, the full moon, so it goes with Kartik Purnima instead: in 2026 all three meet on 24 November, but in 2025 the Telugu full moon came four weeks before the Tamil festival.

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