Dashain (Vijaya Dashami)

Dashain, formally Vijaya Dashami ("Victorious Tenth"), is Nepal's longest and most widely observed festival, celebrating the triumph of good over evil. Its name derives from the Nepali Baḍādaśain — baḍā meaning "great" or "important" and daśain pointing to the tenth day (Sanskrit daśamī) on which the festival culminates. It is also called Nauratha, from the Sanskrit Navaratri ("Nine Nights"), reflecting the nine nights of goddess worship that precede the climactic tenth day.

The festival's central myth recounts the goddess Durga's destruction of the buffalo-demon Mahishasura. According to Hindu tradition, Mahishasura had won a boon that no god or man could kill him, making him invincible and tyrannical. To defeat him, the gods combined their energies to create Durga, a warrior goddess who battled the demon over nine days and slew him on the tenth, restoring cosmic order. The first nine days of Dashain thus dramatize the struggle between Durga's manifestations and the forces of evil, while the tenth day, Vijaya Dashami, marks her victory.

A second strand of mythology connects Dashain to the Ramayana. It is held that Lord Rama worshipped Durga to gain strength before his war against the demon king Ravana, who had abducted his wife Sita, and that Rama vanquished Ravana on the day of Vijaya Dashami. Both narratives share the same theme — the victory of righteousness over demonic power — and together they give Dashain its enduring meaning as a celebration of dharma, courage and the renewal of social bonds.

Dashain unfolds over fifteen days, beginning on the first day of the bright fortnight of Ashwin and ending on the full moon. The opening day, Ghatasthapana, establishes the sacred space: a kalasha (holy pot) symbolizing Durga is filled with water, and barley and maize seeds are sown in it and in a bed of sand within the household prayer room. Kept in darkness and sprinkled with holy water, the seeds sprout over the next nine days into the pale yellow-green shoots called jamara, which are distributed as blessed prasad on the tenth day.

The middle of the festival corresponds to Navaratri, during which the nine forms of Durga (the Nava Durga — Shailaputri, Brahmacharini, Chandraghanta, Kushmanda, Skandamata, Katyayani, Kalaratri, Mahagauri and Siddhidatri) are worshipped in sequence, and scriptures such as the Durga Saptashati (Chandi) are recited. The seventh day, Fulpati ("sacred flowers and leaves"), is marked by a celebrated state procession in which the national Fulpati — a kalasha, banana stalks, jamara and sugar cane bound in red cloth — is carried roughly 169 km on foot over about three days from the ancestral seat at Gorkha to Kathmandu. It is received with great ceremony at Hanuman Dhoka, where the Nepali Army fires a feu de joie and a salute of guns; since the abolition of the monarchy in 2008, the President of Nepal receives the Fulpati in place of the king.

The eighth and ninth days, Maha Ashtami and Maha Navami, are the most intense. On the night of Ashtami, known as Kalratri, the fierce goddess Kali is propitiated, and animal sacrifices — of buffaloes, goats, hens and ducks — are offered at temples across the country; in Kathmandu the historic Taleju Temple opens to the public only on Navami. On these days craftspeople, soldiers, drivers and businesses also perform Vishwakarma and weapon worship, honouring their tools, vehicles and machinery for protection and prosperity. The tenth day, Vijaya Dashami, is the heart of the festival: elders apply tika — a paste of rice, yogurt and red vermilion — and place jamara behind the ears of younger relatives, bestowing blessings for victory, long life and prosperity. The exchange of tika continues for the following days until the fifteenth day, Kojagrat Purnima, when the goddess of wealth Lakshmi is worshipped and people traditionally stay awake through the full-moon night, formally closing the festival.

Although Dashain is observed nationwide, its character varies by region, ethnicity and locality. Among the Newar communities of the Kathmandu Valley, the festival incorporates distinctive rites such as Khadga Puja (worship of swords and weapons) and the Mohani celebration, with the traditional Malshree dhun melody — rooted in Newar devotional music — serving as the musical signature of the season. Many households worship the family deity and ancestral weapons, and the period overlaps with elaborate temple observances at Taleju and other shrines.

Beyond Nepal's borders, Dashain is celebrated wherever Nepali-speaking communities live. In the Indian regions of Darjeeling, Sikkim and Assam it is a major festival for ethnic Nepalis, observed with red tika and family gatherings. In Bhutan, where Dashain is a public holiday, white tika is commonly used in place of the red mark common in Nepal. Nepali-speaking populations in Myanmar and across the global diaspora also keep the festival, often adapting its scale and curtailing animal sacrifice in line with local conditions.

Animal sacrifice, once near-universal during Ashtami and Navami, has become a point of debate in modern Nepal. Animal-welfare advocates have campaigned, including through online petitions, for the practice to be reduced or replaced with symbolic offerings such as pumpkins and coconuts, and a growing number of families now mark the days without blood sacrifice. Some Indigenous (adivasi janajati) groups have also expressed that Dashain, as a state-promoted Hindu festival, does not reflect their own traditions, and have at times organized boycotts, though such campaigns have had limited overall effect on its popularity.

Dashain is as much a feast as a religious observance. The defining dish is khasi ko masu, a rich curry of male goat meat spiced with garlic, ginger and a blend of Nepali masalas, eaten with rice (masu bhat); much of the meat consumed comes from the sacrificial animals offered during the festival and is shared as prasad. Equally iconic is sel roti, a sweet, ring-shaped deep-fried bread made from rice flour, served with yogurt, vegetable curry or pickle. Festive tables also feature aloo dum (spiced potatoes), beaten rice (chiura), assorted achar (pickles), kheer (rice pudding) and a variety of sweets, with the meals binding extended families together over several days of visiting and hosting.

The season has its own outdoor culture. Tall bamboo swings known as linge ping (ping) are erected in villages and courtyards a week or so before Ghatasthapana, often reaching well over twenty feet, and remain up through Tihar; swinging is believed to let people leave the ground in a symbolic gesture of freedom before the new year's work. Kite flying is another hallmark of Dashain, traditionally understood as a way of asking the gods to end the monsoon rains, with children and adults engaging in kite duels and shouting in triumph when an opponent's line is cut.

Card games are a near-ubiquitous Dashain pastime, played among family and friends late into the night, especially on Kojagrat Purnima. Buying and wearing new clothes is a deeply rooted custom, particularly meaningful in poorer households for whom new garments are synonymous with the festival, and local fairs with Ferris wheels and stalls spring up in towns and villages. These shared pleasures — feasting, swinging, kites, cards and new clothes — give Dashain its festive warmth alongside its solemn rites.

At its core, Dashain reaffirms family and community bonds. The giving of tika and jamara flows from elders to juniors, so the festival becomes an annual ritual of reunion in which younger members travel to receive blessings from parents, grandparents and senior relatives. Red, the colour of the tika, symbolizes the blood ties and shared identity that the festival celebrates, and the receiving of jamara grown from seed embodies fertility, renewal and good fortune for the year ahead.

Dashain drives the largest annual movement of people in Nepal. In the days before Vijaya Dashami, large numbers of residents leave Kathmandu and other cities to return to ancestral villages, which for much of the year are populated mainly by the elderly, women and children; homecomings briefly fill rural communities with life. The festival is also Nepal's peak consumption period, with a large share of the year's retail and livestock trade concentrated around Dashain and Tihar; the Department of Livestock Services estimates that roughly four million goats are consumed nationwide — over 75 percent of the country's annual goat consumption — pushing up the price of livestock, clothing and travel.

Remittances make the modern festival possible for many families. Migrant workers abroad send home their largest transfers during the Dashain–Tihar season, and in recent years monthly remittance inflows have reached record highs around this period, funding tika gatherings, new clothes and feasts in towns and villages alike. Government offices, schools and businesses close for an extended public holiday, and the festival's reach now extends across a worldwide Nepali diaspora that recreates its rituals far from home — testament to Dashain's enduring role as the cultural and emotional centre of the Nepali year.