Purnima in 2024 Dates - Purnima This Month and Purnima Tithi Vrat List

What is Purnima?

Purnima is a ‘tithi’ or date in the Hindi or Vedic calendar or simply the night of Full Moon. On this night, the moon is in its full bloom and seen as complete sphere in shape fully illuminated from the light from the Sun falling directly on it without any shadow of the earth on it.

On the 15th tithi of bright half of the Lunar month or during the waxing moon (Shukla paksh) Purnima is observed marking the end of wanning moon phase (Krishna paksha).

The hindu religious belief has a very auspicious and sacred place for tithi of Purnima. In a year there are twelve Purnimas or twelve full moons, one in each month, however there is a difference between the Hindi calendar and the English calendar, and due to this there are two full moon occurrence in a English month. In sauch a case there may be more than 12 Purnimas in a year. These 12 Purnimas are as listed below:-

Pausha Purnima, Magha Purnima, Phalgun Purnima, Chaitra Purnima, Vaishakha Purnima, Jyeshtha Purnima, Ashadha Purnima, Shravana Purnima, Bhadrapada Purnima, Ashwina Purnima, Kartika Purnima, Margashirsha Purnima.

Every Purnima has a religious significance associated to it, each being celebrated as some festival and has a peculiar and distinct method or ‘Vidhi’ of offering prayers or ‘Pooja’. Out of all the Purnimas, five are considered as most auspicious and these are as given below:-

Kartika Purnima- Lord Vishnu and Lord Shiva are worshipped on this Purnima. As per Hindu mythology, it is believed that Lord Shiva killed demon Tripurasur on this day and liberated the all Gods from his ill deeds. On this day, Lord Shiva’s son Krtikey was also born. This Purnima is also believed to be the birth of Lord Vishnu in the incarnation of ‘Matsya’ the fish.

Magha Purnima- As per Hindu mythological belief, on this Purnima Lord Vishnu resides in the ‘Holy Ganga’. Hence as part of the celebration, a holy dip in river Ganga is undertaken by the devotees to take the blessings of Lord Vishnu.

Sharad/ Ashwina Purnima- It is believed that Lord Krishna performed the ‘Raas Lila’ in Vrindavan with ‘Gopis’ on this night. In northern part of the country, Lord Krishna is worshipped on this day. As per one more belief, Goddess Laxmi is said to visit and bless the devotees on this night. Hence, as part of the celebrations, people stay awake for the whole night for the blessings of Goddess Laxmi.

Guru/ Ashadha Purnima – Lord Shiva is worshipped on this day. It is believed that Lord Shiva agreed to be the ‘Guru’ or teacher of seven sages or the ‘Saptrishis’ who worshipped for 84 years to please Lord Shiva and only after this, on the day of Guru Purnima Lord Shiva agreed to take them as his followers.

Buddha/ Vaishakha Purnima- As per Hindu mythology, Lord Buddha took birth on this auspicious Purnima as the ninth incarnation of Lord Vishnu. This day is celebrated as the day of peace, love and non-violence.

Purnimas are considered auspicious days for worshiping and generally it is considered as the best for performing ‘Satyanarayan Poojan’. The devotees also observe fast on this auspicious day and offer prayers. It is believed that by doing so the heart and soul gets cleansed and a sense of spirituality sets in, which brings and end to all the bad times and sufferings.