Kali Puja falls on the new-moon night of Kartik, the night of Diwali. While most of India worships Lakshmi, Bengal worships Kali, dark, four-armed, standing on Shiva, at midnight and until dawn. Houses are lit with rows of clay lamps and candles, fourteen lamps having been lit the evening before for fourteen generations of ancestors, and fireworks go on through the night.
The story
The public worship of Kali in this form is credited to Krishnananda Agamavagisha, a sixteenth-century scholar of Nabadwip, and was spread by Raja Krishnachandra of Nadia in the eighteenth.
It was the poets who made her beloved. Ramprasad Sen, and after him Kamalakanta, sang to the terrible goddess as a child complains to its mother; their Shyama Sangeet is still sung on this night. Ramakrishna was priest of Kali at Dakshineswar.
মন রে কৃষিকাজ জান না, এমন মানব-জমিন রইল পতিত, আবাদ করলে ফলত সোনা
O my mind, you do not know how to farm. This human field has lain fallow; tilled, it would have yielded gold
Ramprasad Sen
How the night goes
- Bhoot ChaturdashiThe evening before: fourteen lamps are lit and fourteen kinds of greens eaten.
- Midnight pujaWith red hibiscus, performed in homes, clubs and cremation grounds.
- DipabaliLamps, candles and strings of lights on every house.
- BhogKhichuri, and in many places meat and fish offered to the goddess.
- Bhai PhontaTwo days later sisters mark their brothers' foreheads with sandal paste.
Why this date
Kali Puja is on the Amavasya of Kartik by the Bengali count, on the day the new-moon tithi covers the hours after sunset; the worship itself is at midnight.
Kali Puja in other years
| Year | Date | Day |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 | Sunday | |
| 2027 | Friday | |
| 2028 | Tuesday | |
| 2029 | Monday | |
| 2030 | Saturday | |
| 2031 | Friday |
More Bengali festivals
10 OctoberBijoya Dashamiবিজয়া দশমী
14 NovemberRash Purnimaরাস পূর্ণিমা
9 OctoberMaha Navamiমহানবমী
7 OctoberMaha Ashtamiমহাষ্টমী
4 SeptemberGanesh Chaturthiগণেশ চতুর্থী
24 AugustJanmashtamiজন্মাষ্টমী
Where to see Kali Puja
In West Bengal
- Dakshineswar Kali TempleWest BengalBhavatarini, the Kali of Ramakrishna, worshipped through the night.
- Kalighat Temple, KolkataWest BengalHere, uniquely, the goddess is worshipped tonight as Lakshmi.
- TarapithWest BengalThe tantric seat of Tara beside a cremation ground in Birbhum.
- BarasatWest BengalFamous for the scale of its Kali Puja pandals.
Across India
- GuwahatiAssamKamakhya, the great tantric temple of the east.
- CuttackOdishaKali Puja pandals as large as those of Durga Puja.
- AyodhyaUttar PradeshThe north's Diwali, for the return of Rama.