Bhai Dooj: 2026 and 2027 dates by city

Kartika Shukla Dwitiya: sisters bless their brothers in the afternoon.

Bhai Dooj, the second day of the bright half of Kartika, closes the five days of Diwali and celebrates the bond of brothers and sisters. It is also Yama Dwitiya: a popular story tells that Yama visited his sister Yamuna, and their shared meal became part of the observance.

Sisters invite their brothers, apply tilak to their forehead, perform aarti and wish them well, then serve them a meal; brothers give gifts and their promise of support. The afternoon is a traditional time for applying tilak. It is called Bhau Beej in Maharashtra and Bhai Phonta in Bengal.

How the date is set

Dwitiya, shukla paksha (waxing Moon), in the month of Kartika by the amanta calendar (the month ends at the new moon). It is kept on the day when the tithi holds the aparahna, the fourth fifth of the daytime.

Dates in 2026 and 2027

The local date in each city; under it, the time of the part of the day the rule looks at, in local time.

In 2026 Delhi keeps it on 11 November; a day apart from that: Kyiv, Kharkiv, Odesa, Dnipro, Lviv, Minsk, Riga, Tbilisi, Chișinău, Berlin, Warsaw, Prague, London, New York, Tel Aviv, Dubai, Toronto, Los Angeles, Chicago, Paris, Madrid, Rome, Istanbul, São Paulo, Mexico City, Buenos Aires, Lisbon.

In 2027 Delhi keeps it on 31 October; a day apart from that: Lviv, Berlin, Warsaw, Prague, London, New York, Toronto, Los Angeles, Chicago, Paris, Madrid, Rome, São Paulo, Mexico City, Buenos Aires, Lisbon.

Smarta rules as published by Drik Panchang. ISKCON and regional calendars can name another day. The time shown is the part of the day the rule looks at, not a muhurat for a particular puja.

How to read the table

Each row is a city from our panchang list, and the date is the local civil date on which Bhai Dooj is kept there by its rule. Under the date is the time of the part of the day that rule looks at, in the city's own local time: for example the pradosh kala, the evening after sunset, or the nishita around midnight. A time past midnight carries (+1). Where the rule names no part of the day, such as a solar ingress or a festival tied to another festival, only the date is given. The city's name opens its panchang for today.

Why the date can differ between cities

A tithi begins and ends at the same moment everywhere, but sunrise, noon and evening come at different local times. If the tithi ends shortly before the evening in one city and shortly after it in another, the two cities keep the festival on different dates. That is why a single date for the whole world is wrong for some places, and why this page gives the date city by city. The difference is almost always one day.

Which calendar this follows

These are the Smarta dates, by the decision rules of the Dharmasindhu and Nirnayasindhu as Drik Panchang publishes them; every city in the table was compared with Drik Panchang's calendar for that city. ISKCON keeps some days, Janmashtami among them, by the Vaishnava rule, and regional calendars can name another day. If your family or temple follows a particular calendar, follow it.

Questions

See also

• Delhi
• Hindu festivals 2026–2027
• Govardhan Puja · Annakut
• Chhath Puja

Positions and tables: sidereal zodiac, Lahiri ayanamsha — the same as professional Jyotish astrologers use, and the same calculation as the charts in JyotiSoft. Updated 2026-10-17.