Navratri

Navratri — Nine Nights of the Goddess

When October arrives and the monsoon rains begin to clear in most of India, there comes a festival that is simultaneously the most solemn and the most jubilant celebration in the Hindu calendar. Navratri — Nava (nine) + Ratri (nights) — is nine nights of the Divine Mother, nine nights of fasting and prayer and celebration, nine nights in which the Goddess is everywhere.

In Gujarat, the sound of Garba fills the night — thousands of dancers in concentric circles, their ghagra cholis whirling in rings of orange and red and green, their feet moving in perfect unison to the beat of the dhol and the melody of devotional songs. In Bengal, enormous Durga Puja pandals rise in every neighborhood, with artisans spending months crafting tableaux of the ten-armed goddess defeating the buffalo demon Mahishasura. In Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, homes fill with Kolu — stepped wooden platforms covered with displayed dolls, figurines, gods, and the entire miniature universe. In Rajasthan, the Dandiya sticks click and clatter as dancers whirl through the night.

One festival. Nine nights. A thousand forms of the same devotion.

The Four Navratris

Navratri is celebrated four times each year — one for each season. The Chaitra Navratri falls in spring (March–April). Two shorter Navratris in between are often observed more quietly. But the Sharad Navratri — the Autumn Navratri — falling in the month of Ashwina (September–October), after the monsoon, is by far the most widely and intensely celebrated.

This is the Navratri that culminates in Vijaya Dashami — Victory Tenth — also called Dussehra. It is the season of the goddess’s great battle, and of her great victory.

The Nine Forms of Durga — Navadurga

The nine days of Navratri are each dedicated to one of the nine manifestations of the Divine Mother:

Day 1 — Shailaputri: Daughter of the Himalayas, riding a bull, holding a trident and lotus. She is the primal energy of nature.

Day 2 — Brahmacharini: The ascetic form, walking barefoot, holding a rosary and water pot. She represents the power of tapas and spiritual discipline.

Day 3 — Chandraghanta: Wearing a crescent moon on her forehead, ten-armed, riding a tiger. She is the warrior who protects.

Day 4 — Kushmanda: The cosmic creator, whose smile and radiance gave birth to the universe. She holds the universe in her palms.

Day 5 — Skandamata: Mother of Skanda (Kartikeya), seated on a lotus, holding her infant son. She represents the fierce love of a mother.

Day 6 — Katyayani: The warrior goddess born from the combined anger of Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva, who could not individually defeat Mahishasura. She is the form of righteous wrath.

Day 7 — Kalaratri: The fierce, dark form — the destroyer of time and ignorance. She is not to be feared but revered.

Day 8 — Mahagauri: The pure white goddess, radiant and peaceful, who has passed through the fire of tapas and emerged transformed.

Day 9 — Siddhidatri: The bestower of all siddhis (spiritual powers), seated on a lotus, worshipped even by Shiva himself.

The three groups of three days correspond to the three great aspects of the Goddess:

• Days 1–3 (Durga): the power that destroys what must be destroyed
• Days 4–6 (Lakshmi): the power that nurtures, sustains, and grants abundance
• Days 7–9 (Saraswati): the power of wisdom, learning, and the arts

This is the teaching of Navratri: complete liberation requires all three — the capacity to destroy what is harmful, to nurture what is good, and to pursue what is true.

The Legend — Durga and Mahishasura

The mythology behind Navratri is told in the Devi Mahatmyam — also called the Durga Saptashati (700 verses of Durga), one of the most sacred texts in Shaktism. It is recited in its entirety during Navratri.

The buffalo demon Mahishasura had performed such intense austerities that Brahma granted him a boon: he could not be killed by any man, god, or demon. Emboldened, Mahishasura attacked the heavens, defeated the gods, and drove them from their abodes. Indra, Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva, collectively humiliated and unable to fight back, poured their combined energies into a single point of blazing light.

From that light arose Durga — the Goddess, ten-armed, each arm bearing a weapon given by one of the gods, riding a lion. She challenged Mahishasura to battle. He laughed at a woman who presumed to face him.

The battle lasted nine days. Mahishasura sent his generals one by one — Chanda, Munda, Raktabija — and the Goddess destroyed each. When she killed Raktabija (Blood-seed), she had to drink every drop of his blood before it touched the ground, lest each drop spawn a new demon. She did.

On the ninth night, Durga confronted Mahishasura himself. He shape-shifted — from buffalo to lion to man to elephant and back to buffalo. Durga pinned him with her foot, drove her trident through him, and cut off his head with her sword.

The ten days of Navratri through Dussehra re-enact this great battle and its resolution.

Garba and Dandiya — Gujarat’s Gift to the World

No celebration of Navratri is as visually glorious as Garba in Gujarat.

Garba is a circular dance performed around a clay pot holding a lamp, or around an image of the Goddess. The name comes from Garbha (womb) — the vessel holding the light, as the womb holds life. Dancers move in concentric circles, clapping their hands in specific rhythms, their feet tracing patterns that have been danced for generations.

The costumes are astonishing — embroidered ghagra cholis and chaniya cholis in every color, with mirror-work that catches the lamplight. In the large Garba grounds of Ahmedabad, Vadodara, and Surat, thousands of dancers move together in the warm October nights, their colors and reflections creating something that looks from above like a great flower opening and closing in rhythm with the music.

Dandiya Raas uses pairs of decorated sticks that dancers click together in patterns — the sticks representing the sword fight between the Goddess and Mahishasura, and also the playful games of Radha and Krishna.

Durga Puja — Bengal’s Five Days

In West Bengal, Odisha, and wherever Bengalis have settled, Navratri becomes Durga Puja — one of the world’s great religious festivals.

The goddess is worshipped through elaborate clay sculptures — 10 to 15 feet tall, depicting Durga with her ten arms, riding her lion, her foot on Mahishasura’s chest. The sculptures are installed in neighborhood pandals — temporary structures built specifically for the festival, sometimes designed as architectural replicas of famous temples or built around artistic themes that have taken months to conceive and construct.

The five main days — Shashthi through Dashami — are a sustained celebration. The air in Kolkata smells of dhunuchi (coconut shell incense), flowers, and fried food from the stalls lining every street. The beating of the dhak drum is constant. The entire city goes outdoors.

On Vijaya Dashami, the goddess’s clay form is carried in procession to the river and immersed. Women apply sindoor (vermilion) to the image and to each other — the Sindoor Khela — before saying goodbye. The immersion is a farewell, and it is genuinely felt as one.

Kolu — The South Indian Tradition

In Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, and Kerala, Navratri is marked with the Kolu (or Golu) — a stepped display of dolls and figurines arranged on wooden platforms covered with cloth.

Every family has a collection of Kolu figurines accumulated across generations — sets of royal courts, temple scenes, animals, divine figures, scenes from the Ramayana and Mahabharata. These are brought out each Navratri and arranged artfully on the steps. Guests are invited to come and view the Kolu, and are given prasad — usually vethalai paaku (betel leaf and areca nut), sundal (seasoned legumes), and sweets.

Ayudha Puja — Worship of Tools

On the ninth day — Mahanavami — Hindus across South India perform Ayudha Puja: the ceremonial worship of their tools and instruments. Farmers wash and garland their plows. Mechanics lay their wrenches before an image of the Goddess. Drivers wash their vehicles and place garlands on the steering wheel. Musicians set their instruments before the deity. Artists lay their brushes and paints as offerings.

The practice recognizes something profound: every tool, however mundane, is an extension of the divine creative power. The knife that feeds the family, the needle that clothes it, the plough that grows its food — all of these participate in the cosmic energy of Shakti. To worship the tools is to acknowledge this.

The Spiritual Heart of Navratri

Beyond its cultural diversity, Navratri carries a single message: Shakti is real.

Shakti is the feminine divine energy that underlies all of creation — the power without which Shiva himself, the pure consciousness, would be a still and silent void. She is the force that animates the cosmos, that moves the seasons, that drives the tides, that makes the seed break open underground and push upward toward the light.

The nine-night fast is not mere austerity. It is a clearing — a quieting of the outward-moving energy of appetite and distraction so that something subtler can be heard. Through those nine nights of restraint, prayer, and devotional practice, the devotee becomes a vessel empty enough to receive what the Goddess has to give.

Om Aim Hreem Kleem Chamundaye Vichche. Victory to the Divine Mother.