What is Dashain?
दशैं
Dashain is the longest and biggest Nepali festival: fifteen days of family, jamara and tika from elders, celebrating good over evil.
What Dashain is
Dashain, also called Bada Dashain, is the longest festival in the Nepali calendar and, for many families, the most important one. It marks the goddess Durga's victory over the demon Mahishasura, and with it the idea that good wins over evil.
For most people who grew up with it, Dashain is less about the story and more about going home. Offices and schools in Nepal close, people travel back to their family house, and the days are spent visiting relatives in order of seniority.
Ghatasthapana and planting jamara
Dashain begins on Ghatasthapana. A kalash, a pot of holy water that stands for the goddess, is set up in a room kept for worship, often called the Dashain ghar. Barley seeds, and in some families maize, are sown in clean sand or soil around it.
The seeds grow for about ten days with little or no sunlight, which is why jamara comes up a pale yellow-green rather than bright green. Someone in the family tends it and offers prayers each morning. In the USA, families often grow jamara indoors in a tray or pot kept out of direct sun.
Fulpati, Ashtami and Navami
On the seventh day, Fulpati, a bundle of sacred flowers, leaves and plants is brought into the house or temple. The eighth and ninth days, Maha Ashtami and Maha Navami, are the main days of Durga worship. Many families offer animal sacrifices; many others offer fruit, vegetables such as pumpkin, or prayers only.
On Navami, people also bless the tools of their work: vehicles, machines and instruments are cleaned and given tika so they keep the household safe through the year.
Vijaya Dashami: the day of tika
The tenth day, Vijaya Dashami, is the day most people mean when they say Dashain. Elders put tika on the foreheads of younger relatives: a paste of rice, yogurt and red vermilion. They place jamara on the head or behind the ear and give a blessing for health, learning and long life, with a small gift of money called dakshina.
Families visit each other for tika for several more days, until Kojagrat Purnima, the full moon that closes the festival. Elders are visited in order, closest and most senior first.
Practice varies. Some families and communities use a white tika instead of red, some do not mark Dashain at all, and a family in its year of mourning usually does not celebrate or receive tika.
The rest of the season
Dashain is also new clothes, a family meal with meat for those who eat it, card games, kites in the clear autumn sky and the ping, a tall bamboo swing built in villages and neighbourhoods.
Away from Nepal, Dashain is often the hardest time to be far from family. Community gatherings and open tables, where newcomers can receive tika from an elder, carry much of what the family house used to.
Common questions
- Dashain kahile ho? When is Dashain 2026?
- Dashain follows the lunar calendar, so the date moves every year. It usually falls between late September and October. The exact days are confirmed each year from the Nepal government calendar; see the Dashain 2026 page.
- What is in Dashain tika?
- Dashain tika is usually raw rice mixed with yogurt and red vermilion, put on the forehead by an elder. Some families and communities use a white tika instead.
- What is jamara?
- Jamara is the pale yellow-green shoots of barley, and sometimes maize, sown on the first day of Dashain and grown out of the sun. Elders give it with tika on Vijaya Dashami.
- What is dakshina?
- Dakshina is the small gift of money an elder gives with tika and a blessing. It is a token of good wishes rather than a present to be measured.