The festival of colours, it is celebrated with full joy and ardour on the full moon day in the month of Phalgun which is the month of March as per the Gregorian calendar.

This festival may be celebrated differently at different places with different traditions. Most of the people wear a festive look at the time of this colourful celebration. Marketplaces are crowded with shopkeepers preparing for the festival. Gulal, pichkare and colour can be seen on the road side days before the festival.

Females of the house start preparing sweets for the festival, especially the basic sweet of holy gujiya is prepared by most of them for family, friends and relatives also.

Everybody gets excited about the arrival of holy as the festive itself is the symbol of joy and happiness.Holi is also called the Spring Festival, as it marks the arrival of spring the season of hope and joy.The dusk of the winter goes and the holy promises of bright summer days, nature too promises the best harvest to the farmers and flowers bloom colouring the surroundings and filling fragrance in the air.

A Hindu festival, Holi has various legends associated with it. There was once a king by the name of Hiranyakashyap who won over the kingdom of earth. He was so egoistic that he commanded everybody in his kingdom to worship only him. But to his great disappointment, his son, Prahlad became a very intense devotee of Lord Narayana and refused to worship his father. Hiranyakashyap tried several ways to kill his son Prahlad but Lord Vishnu saved him every time. Finally, he asked his sister, "Holika" to enter a dazzling fire with Prahlad in her lap. For, Hiranyakashyap knew that Holika had a blessing, whereby, she could enter the fire unharmed.

Faithlessly, Holika influenced young Prahlad to sit in her lap and she herself took her seat in a dazzling fire. The story has it that Holika had to pay the price of her sinister desire by her life. Holika was not aware that the blessing worked only when she entered the fire alone. Prahlad, who kept chanting the name of Lord Narayana all this while, came out unharmed, as the lord blessed him for his extreme devotion. Thus, Holi derives its name from Holika. And, is celebrated as a festival of victory of good over evil.

The celebration begins on the eve of Holi with the ritual of Holika Dahan. Holika Dahan, or burning of demon Holika, is the vital ritual during Holi festival. On a night before Holi, people collect wooden logs and waste materials like broken furniture, clothes, etc from their home and gather it together to burn Holika. This bonfire epitomizes the victory of good over evil. It is also even termed as the cleansing ceremony before the actual Holi festival. Read more at

Holi is also celebrated as the triumph of a devotee.

This incident thus reestablished the faith of people in the ultimate divine power and is thus celebrated as the day of eternal love, devotion, blessings and the victory of Good over evil.

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