A married woman's dawn-to-moonrise fast, broken only at the sight of the moon.
Thursday, 29 October 2026·Kartika Krishna Chaturthi, at moonrise·Mumbai, Maharashtra
Sighting the moon through a sieve, offering arghya, and breaking the fast.
Evening worship of Shiva, Parvati, Ganesha and Karwa Mata, and the reading of the katha.
General auspicious activity and puja preparations.
Karwa Chauth is a fast kept by married women for the long life, health and well-being of their husbands. From before sunrise until the moon rises, the fast is nirjala - taken without food or water. The day turns on a single ritual moment: the sighting of the moon, after which the woman offers arghya and breaks her fast.
The observance binds marital love to disciplined austerity: the wife's fast is an offering, and the moon - cool, steady and long-enduring - is invoked as a giver of longevity. Seeing the husband's face through the sieve after the moon completes the vow.
To pray for the husband's long life and the couple's enduring bond, and to renew the vow of devotion each year.
The fast is tied to several legends of wifely devotion. Queen Veervati, tricked by her brothers into breaking the fast early with a false moon, saw her husband fall gravely ill; only by keeping the fast rightly the following year did she restore him. The steadfast Savitri won back the life of her husband Satyavan from Yama through sheer resolve. Draupadi too is said to have observed the fast on Krishna's counsel for the welfare of the Pandavas. Together these stories cast Karwa Chauth as a vow whose power lies in unbroken constancy.
Only after the moon is sighted and arghya offered - see the Chandra Darshan window above for your location.
The sieve frames the moon and, turning it toward the husband, lets the woman first behold the moon and then her husband's face before ending the fast.
Yes - increasingly they observe it for a future or intended husband, though the classical vow is for married women.