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Holika Dahan 2026

होलिका दहन

Holika Dahan falls on Tuesday, 3 March 2026 in New Delhi, on Shukla Purnima.

Holika Dahan is the bonfire lit on the full-moon evening before Holi, when neighbourhoods burn wood, dung cakes and old things together. It's most often told as the story of a boy, Prahlada, who survives a fire meant to kill him.

Why this date

It falls on Phalguna Purnima, the full moon, in Pradosh, the evening window after sunset. There's one extra rule: panchangs avoid Bhadra, an inauspicious half-tithi, so if Bhadra is running that evening, the fire may wait until it ends. That's why the listed time can sometimes be late at night.

That’s 10 days earlier than 13 March 2025 last year.

Purnima begins
2 Mar, 5:56 PM
It ends
3 Mar, 5:08 PM
2026 date by city
New DelhiTue, 3 Mar
MumbaiMon, 2 Mar
KolkataMon, 2 Mar
ChennaiTue, 3 Mar
BengaluruTue, 3 Mar
HyderabadTue, 3 Mar
AhmedabadMon, 2 Mar
PuneMon, 2 Mar
JaipurTue, 3 Mar
LucknowTue, 3 Mar
PatnaMon, 2 Mar
VaranasiTue, 3 Mar
LondonMon, 2 Mar
New YorkMon, 2 Mar
San FranciscoMon, 2 Mar
TorontoMon, 2 Mar
SydneyTue, 3 Mar
SingaporeMon, 2 Mar
DubaiMon, 2 Mar
Port LouisMon, 2 Mar

Dates in bold differ from New Delhi’s. Calculated by rule; local practice can differ.

One festival, many stories

North IndiaHolika and Prahlada

In the most common telling, the demon-king Hiranyakashipu is enraged that his son Prahlada worships Vishnu. His sister Holika, immune to fire, takes the boy into a blaze on her lap; she burns, and he walks out. The fire is what the bonfire re-enacts, and Lochtefeld describes it as the model for the custom. Interestingly, the Bhagavata Purana's own account of Prahlada lists the ways his father tried to kill him without naming Holika in that passage.

Folk beliefJames G. Lochtefeld, The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Hinduism (Rosen, 2002), entry “Holika”; Bhagavata Purana 7.5.43–44
South IndiaThe burning of Kama

In parts of the south the fire is associated with Shiva reducing Kama, the god of love, to ashes. Kalidasa tells the burning itself in the Kumarasambhava, but the link to this day comes from regional practice.

Folk beliefKalidasa, Kumarasambhava
Older textsDhundha the ogress

Secondary sources also report a version from the Bhavishya tradition, in which an ogress called Dhundha troubles children and is driven away by noise and fire. We haven't read the passage for ourselves, so this is reported here at second hand.

Folk belief
Rural north IndiaA fire for the new crop

Many families still roast fresh grain or green chickpeas in the flames, and this explains one traditional etymology, holaka, for half-roasted grain. Whatever the fire meant first, its place in the farming year is easy to see: it comes as winter crops are ripening.

Practical

Common questions

What people do
  • Collecting wood and dung cakes for a neighbourhood fire in the days before
  • Circling the fire and offering grain, coconut or sweets
  • Roasting new grain in the flames and sharing it
  • Throwing old or broken things on the pile, to clear out the year
Why is Holika Dahan sometimes so late at night?

Because panchangs avoid lighting the fire in Bhadra, a part of the lunar day that's considered inauspicious. If Bhadra covers the early evening, the listed time moves until it has ended. This is a rule of timing tradition, and families and priests follow it to varying degrees.

Is Holika Dahan the same day as Holi?

No, it's the evening before. Holika Dahan is the fire on the full-moon evening, and the colours come the next morning.

Is the Holika story in the Bhagavata Purana?

Prahlada's story is, but the passage listing his father's attempts on his life doesn't name Holika. She's central to the popular version, but we haven't been able to confirm where she first appears in writing.

Ask your elders

“Ask your elders how the neighbourhood collected wood for the Holika when they were young, and what they stole for it. Ask if they ever roasted chana or wheat in the fire and shared it the next morning.”

Keep reading

Sources
  1. James G. Lochtefeld, The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Hinduism (Rosen, 2002), entries “Holika” and “Holi”
  2. Bhagavata Purana 7.5
  3. Drik Panchang, Holika Dahan timing rules
  4. P. V. Kane, History of Dharmaśāstra, Vol. V, Part I (Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute), on vratas and utsavas
  5. Kalidasa, Kumarasambhava