Karwa Chauth 2026: Date, Puja Muhurat, Moonrise Time & Vidhi

When Is Karwa Chauth 2026?

Karwa Chauth 2026 falls on Thursday, 29 October. It is kept on the Chaturthi of the Krishna Paksha that follows Sharad Purnima, and it is a day long fast kept mainly by married women, broken in the evening after the moon has been sighted.

Two timings govern the day. In Surat the puja muhurat runs from 06:05 PM to 07:20 PM, and the moon rises at 08:55 PM.

Those are not the same moment, and the fast is not broken at the end of the puja. It runs on for about an hour and thirty five minutes after the window closes, until the moon is sighted and the arghya is offered. Families who plan the evening around the puja alone are the ones caught out.

Karwa Chauth 2026 Date, Tithi and Timings

One distinction in that table matters. The tithi begins and ends at single astronomical moments, so 01:06 AM and 10:09 PM read the same across the country in IST. The puja window and the moonrise are local figures, set for Surat. If you are outside Surat and the towns around it, use a Panchang set to your own city for those two, or ask your pandit to confirm them before the day.

Our Choghadiya timings cover the auspicious windows across the day, and the guide on choosing a shubh muhurat explains how these windows are worked out.

The Gap Between the Puja and the Moonrise

The two timings are fixed by different things. The puja belongs to the evening period after sunset, while the Chaturthi tithi is still running, which is what puts it between 06:05 PM and 07:20 PM. Moonrise is fixed by the moon, which on this date is a few days past full. After Purnima the moon rises later every night, so by this night it comes up well after dark. In Surat in 2026 that lands it at 08:55 PM.

The evening therefore has a shape to it. The puja and the katha are done first, inside the muhurat. Then there is a wait of about an hour and thirty five minutes at the end of a nirjala day, the hardest part of the fast for most who keep it. Then the moon is sighted, the arghya is offered, and the fast is broken.

Two things make it easier. Keep the thali assembled before the puja begins, and settle in advance where the moon will be visible from.

There is no risk of running out of tithi. The moon rises at 08:55 PM and Chaturthi runs until 10:09 PM, so the sighting and the arghya both fall inside it with room to spare.

Why Karwa Chauth Falls on 29 October

The Chaturthi tithi begins at 01:06 AM on 29 October and ends at 10:09 PM the same night. It therefore covers the sunrise of the 29th and no other sunrise, and it is still running at moonrise that evening.

That is unusually clean. A vrat kept with a moonrise arghya can be pulled between two dates when the tithi covers one day’s sunrise and another day’s moonrise, which is where competing dates in different calendars come from. Nothing of that kind happens here, and only one date can carry the vrat in 2026.

One note on the month name. North Indian calendars, which count the month from one full moon to the next, file this as Kartik Krishna Chaturthi. Gujarati and Marathi Panchangs count the month from the new moon and place the same day in Ashwin. The date, the tithi and the timings are identical either way.

Sargi, the Meal Before Dawn

The fast opens with sargi, taken before sunrise on the morning of the vrat. By tradition it is sent or given by the mother-in-law. The sargi as a named ritual is strongest in Punjabi families, where it classically includes feniyan, and elsewhere the pre-dawn meal is kept more simply. Where the fuller form is followed, and in families living apart it is often sent ahead in the days before. It usually holds fruit, dry fruit, sweets and something more substantial such as a paratha or kheer, along with water taken before dawn.

There is no muhurat for it and no clock time attached to it. It simply has to be finished before sunrise. Most households keep it light on heavily salted and fried food, since nothing else is taken for the rest of the day.

What the Fast Involves

The vrat is most commonly kept nirjala, without food or water, from before sunrise until the moon has been sighted and the arghya offered. It is kept for the long life and wellbeing of the husband, which is the intention the tradition attaches to it.

Practice varies more than the reputation of the fast suggests. Some households take water or tea through the day, some keep a phalahar fast on fruit and milk, and some keep the nirjala form only until the puja. The form followed is generally the one the family has always followed.

If a nirjala fast is unsuitable for your health, keep the lighter form or offer the puja without fasting.

Karwa Chauth Puja Vidhi

Most families perform this puja at home without a pandit.

Steps for the Karwa Chauth puja

1. Take the sargi before sunrise, then take the sankalp for the vrat, stating your name and gotra.
2. Bathe and wear clean clothes. Many wear red or the colours their family keeps for the day.
3. Clean the puja space and lay a chowki with a clean cloth in the evening, before the muhurat opens.
4. Place the image or murti of Gauri with Ganesh. Households keeping the fuller set place Shiva and Kartikeya alongside them, and some prepare a small Gauri figure from clean earth.
5. Establish a kalasha with water beside them, and place the karwa, filled with water and covered, with a lid holding rice or wheat and a coin.
6. Offer chandan, kumkum, haldi, akshat and fresh flowers, and light the deep and dhoop.
7. Offer the naivedya, usually halwa, puri, sweets and fruit.
8. Read or hear the Karwa Chauth vrat katha. The katha is part of the vidhi and is kept within the puja window.
9. Where the women of a family or a neighbourhood exchange karwas among themselves, this is done after the katha.
10. Perform the aarti, then set the evening thali ready before the wait for the moon begins.

Karwa Chauth Puja Samagri

The karwa and the sieve are the two items households most often find missing on the day, so gather the samagri a few days ahead.

• Karwa, the earthen or metal pot with a spout, and a lid for it
• Image or murti of Gauri with Ganesh, and a chowki with a clean cloth
• Sieve, and a thali to carry the evening items
• Kalasha with water, and a separate lota of water for the arghya
• Chandan, kumkum, haldi, akshat, roli and moli
• Fresh flowers, a garland and durva
• Deep, ghee or oil, cotton wicks, dhoop and camphor
• Halwa, puri, sweets, fruit and the naivedya your household prepares
• Rice or wheat, a coin and dakshina for the karwa
• The Karwa Chauth vrat katha, printed or in your family’s book
• Bangles, bindi, sindoor and the suhag items your family includes

Your pandit may add items specific to your family tradition, so confirm the list a few days before.

The Karwa, the Thali and the Sieve

Three objects carry this vrat, and each does a particular job.

The karwa is the pot the day is named after, earthen or metal, with a spout. It is filled with water, covered, and worshipped through the puja, and in many households it is later given away with the daan rather than kept.

The thali is assembled for the evening and carries the lit diya, the water for the arghya, roli, akshat, sweets and the karwa.

The sieve is the object people ask about most. At moonrise the moon is looked at through the chalni, which is then turned so that the husband is seen through it, before the arghya is offered. Explanations for it differ between families and regions and no single one is settled, so the practice is kept as the household has always kept it.

As for why the moon is involved at all, Chaturthi in the Krishna Paksha is a tithi associated with Ganesh and observed with a moonrise arghya in several vrats, not only this one, which is also why Ganesh sits with Gauri in the puja here.

Moonrise, the Arghya and the Parana

The moon rises at 08:55 PM in Surat. Sighting it can take longer than that, depending on the direction the house faces and what stands in the way, which in a Surat apartment usually means the next tower. Where cloud or a blocked view delays it, families wait, move to a terrace or an open side of the building, or in some households take the moon as risen at the published time and offer the arghya in its direction. Practice varies, so settle what your family does before the day rather than during it.

Once the moon is sighted, it is viewed through the sieve, the sieve is turned to the husband, and water is offered to the moon as arghya from the lota. The husband then gives the first sip of water and the first bite of food, and that is the parana, the point at which the fast ends. Where the husband is away, the arghya is offered to the moon in the same way and the fast is broken after it, with the family member present giving the water or the woman taking it herself. Households keeping this form often add a phone or video call at the moment. Nothing in the vrat is left incomplete by his absence. Chaturthi runs until 10:09 PM, so the whole sequence sits inside the tithi.

Karwa Chauth Vrat Katha

The katha is read during the puja, before the wait for the moon, and it is the reason the vrat is kept as strictly as it is.

The story most often told is that of Veeravati, the only sister of seven brothers, who kept her first Karwa Chauth after marriage at her parents’ house. She had fasted since before dawn and by evening she was faint with it. Her brothers, unable to watch, made a false moon. Accounts differ on how, some saying they lit a fire behind a peepal tree and others that they held up a mirror through the leaves. They told her the moon had risen.

She offered the arghya, broke her fast, and word came almost at once that her husband was dead.

She refused to accept it. She kept vigil beside him and kept the vrat again in its full observance, and Goddess Parvati appeared to her and told her what had happened, that the fast had been broken before the moon had truly risen. When Veeravati kept the vrat properly, her husband was restored to her.

The katha is told to explain why the moon is waited for rather than assumed, and that is the whole of its practical content. It is not a warning about what follows a mistake. A fast kept in good faith is kept, and a household that has waited as best it could has done what the vrat asks.

Other tellings are kept in other households, including the story of Karva, who saved her husband from a crocodile, and in some families the story of Savitri. Where your household has a katha it has always read, read that one.

Karwa Chauth in Surat and Gujarat

Karwa Chauth is chiefly a North Indian observance. In Surat it is kept largely by North Indian families settled in the city, and by households that have taken it up through marriage or custom. It does not sit in the traditional Gujarati calendar the way Navratri or Sharad Purnima do.

That has one practical consequence. The karwa, the sieve and the suhag samagri are not stocked in every neighbourhood shop here in the way they are further north, so buy them a few days ahead rather than on the day.

The date also sits in a full stretch of the calendar. Sharad Purnima falls on 25 October, Karwa Chauth on the 29th, and the Diwali run begins in the first week of November, which is covered separately. Households keeping several of these are better off buying for the whole run at once.

Booking a Pandit and Karwa Chauth Udyapan

Most families keep the annual vrat at home, and the vidhi above is well within reach of a household with the samagri ready and the katha to hand.

A pandit is called for the fuller occasions, most often a first Karwa Chauth after a wedding, where a family wants the sankalp made in form, and the udyapan.

Udyapan is the formal conclusion of the vrat once it has been kept for the number of years a family has undertaken. It is a longer ceremony than the annual puja and usually includes:

• The sankalp of completion, stating the years kept
• The Gauri puja in its fuller form
• Daan, generally including the karwa and the suhag samagri
• The feeding of the guests and brahmans invited

The number of years kept before an udyapan follows family practice rather than one fixed count, so confirm it with your pandit for your own tradition. Households often keep a Satyanarayan katha alongside the udyapan, and the same arrangement is common for Anant Chaturdashi udyapan.

Pandit Ramkishan Joshi performs Karwa Chauth puja and Karwa Chauth udyapan at homes across Surat and the surrounding areas, and can confirm the puja window and the moonrise for your own location.

Festival dates are usually taken about a month in advance, and 29 October sits between Sharad Purnima and Diwali in one of the fullest stretches of the year. Udyapan needs more notice still. To arrange either, get in touch with your location and whether you are keeping the annual vrat or concluding it, and the samagri list will be shared beforehand.