Why do Lakshmi Puja timings differ from site to site?
लक्ष्मी पूजा का समय अलग-अलग क्यों होता है?
The short answer
Because they answer different questions. Some give Pradosh, the evening window. Some give the stretch when Taurus is rising, inside that window. And Pradosh itself has more than one definition. Worked out separately, three of the five published Delhi times we compared for 2026 fall into place.
The three rules, worked out for New Delhi on 8 November 2026
The sites we compared agree on the day. The Amavasya (dark-moon lunar day) of Kartika ran from 11:28 AM on 8 November to 12:32 PM on 9 November, so it was in force at sunset only on the 8th. The arguments are about the hour.
| Rule | How it’s defined | Our result |
|---|---|---|
| Pradosh, long | Sunset, plus one fifth of the night (3 of its 15 muhurtas) | 5:31 PM – 8:09 PM |
| Pradosh, fixed | Sunset, plus 2 hours 24 minutes | 5:31 PM – 7:55 PM |
| Vrishabha lagna | The sign Taurus rising in the east. It counts as a “fixed” sign, so the wealth invited in is said to stay. | 5:55 PM – 7:50 PM |
What sites published, checked against those rules
These are the windows we found when writing this page, all for New Delhi unless marked. We note where a calculation agrees, and where we simply can’t explain the difference yet.
| Source | Window | Explanation |
|---|---|---|
| Drik Panchang, as cited by Vedantu, Hindutone and PanchangBodh | 5:54 – 7:50 PM | Vrishabha lagna: matches our calculation to within a minute. |
| Hindutone (Pradosh) | 5:31 – 8:09 PM | Sunset plus a fifth of the night: matches our calculation to within a minute. |
| PanchangBodh (Pradosh) | 5:31 – 7:55 PM | Sunset plus a fixed 2 hours 24 minutes: matches our calculation. |
| DekhoPanchang | 5:48 – 7:14 PM | It describes Pradosh as about 96 minutes from sunset, but this window is 86 minutes long. In all six cities it lists, the window starts 17 minutes after sunset. It doesn't say why, so we can't tie that to a rule. |
| SmartPuja | 5:32 – 7:28 PM | Not reproduced. It calls this Vrishabha Kaal, but it starts 22 minutes before the time we get, and it doesn't say why. |
| Shubhpanchang (Surat) | 6:29 – 8:29 PM | Not a Delhi time: its page says all its timings are for Surat, Gujarat. We leave it out of the count. |
Same rule, different city
Taurus rises at a different moment everywhere, so the window moves far more than the date does. Here is the Vrishabha window inside Pradosh, for Diwali in 2026 (8 November in Delhi).
| New Delhi | 8 Nov | 5:55 PM – 7:50 PM |
|---|---|---|
| Mumbai | 8 Nov | 6:28 PM – 8:28 PM |
| Kolkata | 8 Nov | 5:21 PM – 7:19 PM |
| Chennai | 8 Nov | 6:07 PM – 8:09 PM |
| Bengaluru | 8 Nov | 6:18 PM – 8:20 PM |
| Hyderabad | 8 Nov | 6:08 PM – 8:09 PM |
| Ahmedabad | 8 Nov | 6:23 PM – 8:21 PM |
| Pune | 8 Nov | 6:25 PM – 8:25 PM |
| Jaipur | 8 Nov | 6:04 PM – 8:00 PM |
| Lucknow | 8 Nov | 5:43 PM – 7:40 PM |
| Patna | 8 Nov | 5:29 PM – 7:26 PM |
| Varanasi | 8 Nov | 5:38 PM – 7:35 PM |
| London | 8 Nov | 4:35 PM – 6:12 PM |
| New York | 8 Nov | 5:03 PM – 6:51 PM |
| San Francisco | 8 Nov | 5:23 PM – 7:13 PM |
| Toronto | 8 Nov | 5:17 PM – 7:03 PM |
| Sydney | 8 Nov | 8:05 PM – 9:33 PM |
| Singapore | 8 Nov | 7:20 PM – 9:14 PM |
| Dubai | 8 Nov | 5:59 PM – 7:56 PM |
| Port Louis | 8 Nov | 6:55 PM – 8:35 PM |
Which one should you use?
That’s your family’s call, and it isn’t a question astronomy can settle. If your family follows a pandit or a printed panchang, that’s the answer for you. If you want a default, the Taurus window inside Pradosh is the most widely published, and it’s what Spasht shows first.
Sources
- Spasht’s own calculation: Swiss Ephemeris, Moshier model, Lahiri ayanamsa, New Delhi
- Published windows from Vedantu, Hindutone, PanchangBodh, SmartPuja, Shubhpanchang and DekhoPanchang, retrieved 8 November 2026 and rechecked 9 November