छठ महापर्व
About Chhath Puja
A festival of the sun
Chhath is offered to Surya Dev, the sun, and to Chhathi Maiya, said to be his sister and the protector of children. It is one of the few festivals in which the setting sun is worshipped before the rising one — gratitude first, then hope.
A vrat of pure discipline
There is no idol, no priest and no temple. The vratti fasts for around 36 hours without water, cooks the prasad herself on a mud stove, and stands in a river or pond to offer arghya. Purity of body, kitchen and intention is the entire ritual.
Where it is celebrated
Chhath is rooted in Bihar, Jharkhand and eastern Uttar Pradesh, and in the Terai belt of Nepal. Wherever Bhojpuri, Magahi and Maithili speakers have travelled — Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Mauritius, Fiji, Trinidad — a ghat is improvised and the songs follow.
Why the songs matter
Chhath geet are the festival's memory. Sung by women in courtyards and on the walk to the ghat, they carry the whole ritual — the bahangi, the soop, the sugarcane, the waiting for the first ray. Sharda Sinha's voice made these songs the sound of the season for generations, and singers like Anuradha Paudwal, Kalpana Patowary and Maithili Thakur have kept them alive.
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