Holi Festival Dates 2024 Celebration
Holi in on Mon, 25 Mar, 2024. According to Hindu calendar Holi is celebrated on the full moon day in the month of Phalguna, which usually falls in March.
Holi Festival History
Holi is an indigenous Indian festival celebrated only in India. Similar festival is not available anywhere else in the world. The festival comes in the month of March. This is a festival in celebration of new crops of the Rabi. The agriculture period from October to March is very important as this period yields the major crop of the grains like wheat, barley, gram and rice. The festival is celebrated on the full moon of the Hindu month of ‘Phalgun’.
Holi Festival Story
The festival though begins by a period of 15 days where the beginning of festival celebration is announced. Even today in the countryside India evening singing and dancing begins very early but due to the constraints of the urban life which particularly involves the long busy hours and unawareness of the festival. It is celebrated only for two days. The festival has great religious significance having a moral that evil though prosper at certain point time, cannot last forever and the truth is the real energy of the universe and human life. The demon king Hiranyakashap had peculiar vows granted by the Gods for a long life free of misery and poverty and of not being killed by any human or animal. He continued to inflict cruelty and pain upon his people, he does not even spare his son Prahalad who has a strong faith in the supreme God ‘Narayana’. The demon king did not like this devotion of his son towards the God ‘Narayana’ and tries to kill him by several tricks like drowning him in the well, throwing him from top of the hill, burning him in the fire but each time the divine favour saves him miraculously. One day when he is bent upon to kill his son Prahalad, Lord Narayana appears in a unique divine form of half lion and half human being, the Lord’s upper body part was that of a lion and the lower part was of a human being. The incarnated Lord Narsingh kills the demon king and saves his devotee Prahalad. From that day in the evening throughout India people arrange the dry woods and bushes in the form of circular pyramid and as a representative of Prahalad, they put one long wooden long in the centre, chanting the holy mantras, the fire is lit and wooden log which symbolizes Prahalad is removed from the fire. This is in saying that the truth neither can be burnt or destroyed by any means.
Next day people out the coloured powder on each others faces which is called ‘Gulaal’, sweets are distributed, wishes are exchanged and lots of merry making takes place. Holi is the festival which shows social equality and the prevalence of good virtues in the society.
