Malayalam Calendar (Kollavarsham Date & Panchangam)

About the Malayalam Calendar (Kollavarsham Date & Panchangam)

A month of the Malayalam calendar (Kollavarsham) for your own town. Every day shows its Malayalam date — the day of Chingam, Kanni, Thulam … Karkidakam — with the nakshatram (naal) and thithi current at sunrise, and the Kollam era year heads the month. Vishu, Thiruvonam with the other Onam days, Karkidaka Vavu and Kerala’s Vijayadashami are worked out by their rules, with the monthly Vavu days, Ekadashi and Pradosham. Tap a day for its panchangam — thithi, naal, yogam and karanam with their ending times, sunrise and sunset — and its Rahu kalam, Yamagandam and Gulika.

A Malayalam month begins when the Sun enters the next sidereal sign: on that day when the Sankranti falls in the first three-fifths of the daytime, otherwise on the next day. Calculated this way, with the ayanamsa of the Rashtriya Panchang, every month beginning matches its table for Kerala. Names are in Malayalam and English; print the month on A4 or Letter, save it as CSV, or add the year’s festivals to your phone calendar. Everything is calculated on your device.

How the Malayalam date is worked out

The Malayalam months are solar. Each lasts while the Sun is in one sidereal sign — Chingam while it is in Simha, Kanni in Kanya, and so on to Karkidakam in Karkata — so a month has 29 to 32 days. The Sun’s sidereal position uses the variable (Chitrapaksha) ayanamsa of the Rashtriya Panchang, and the first day follows the Kerala rule: when the Sankranti (the Sun’s entry into the sign) comes within the first three-fifths of the daytime — the end of the madhyahna, 18 of the day’s 30 ghatikas, the “18 ghatika rule” of the Indian Astronomical Ephemeris — the month begins that day; later, it begins the next day.

The three-fifths are of the real daytime, from sunrise to sunset, not a fixed 7 h 12 min: the two differ by up to about twenty minutes and give different first days only rarely — five months between 1990 and 2034 at Thiruvananthapuram — and where they differed, Kerala’s almanacs followed the three-fifths. The tests compare every month beginning with the Rashtriya Panchang’s table for Kerala and Makaram 1 with the Ephemeris’ Tai Pongal (Kerala) over several years; all agree.

The Kollam year, naal and thithi

• Year: the Kollam era (Kollavarsham) year begins on Chingam 1, the Malayalam New Year; the Rashtriya Panchang’s table of eras gives the current one.
• Naal and thithi: the nakshatram and thithi current at sunrise name the day; the panchangam gives when they end and what follows. A “+” marks a thithi that begins and ends before the next sunrise, a ² the second day of a thithi.
• Vavu: Karutha Vavu (Amavasi) and Velutha Vavu (Pournami) are kept on the day whose sunrise they cover; Ekadashi follows the Smarta rule, with the Vaishnava day when it differs; Pradosham is the day Thrayodashi covers sunset.

Vishu, Onam and the other festivals

• Vishu: Medam 1, the first day of Medam by the Kerala rule above. When the Sun enters Mesha late in the day, Medam 1 — and Vishu — is the next day, as on 15 April in 2019 and 2023. The national almanac lists Vishu with the Sankranti day itself, so it can show the day before.
• Thiruvonam (Onam): the day of Chingam whose sunrise falls in Thiruvonam nakshatra; when Chingam has two such days, the second. Uthradom (First Onam) is the day before, Third and Fourth Onam the two days after.
• Karkidaka Vavu: the Amavasi of Karkidakam, on the day it covers the afternoon — the time of the Vavu bali offerings.
• Vijayadashami (Vidyarambham): Ashwin Shukla Dashami on the day it covers the forenoon, the Kerala rule the Ephemeris gives; it can be a day after the Dussehra of north India.
• Also marked: Durgashtami, Vinayaka Chathurthi, Deepavali (Naraka Chaturdashi at dawn) and Maha Shivaratri by the Rashtriya Panchang’s rules.

The tests compare Thiruvonam with the Indian Astronomical Ephemeris over eight years, Karkidaka Vavu over eight and Vijayadashami over seven; all agree.

Temple calendars

This calendar is computed from the true positions of the Sun and the Moon, as the Rashtriya Panchang is. Temple and family almanacs can use other methods and can differ by a day when a Sankranti or a nakshatram changes near the boundary that decides the day; for temple festivals and birthday stars, follow your temple’s own calendar.

Sources

• India Meteorological Department, Positional Astronomy Centre: Rashtriya Panchang — Regional calendars, Chronological eras and Explanation — and the festival criteria of the Indian Astronomical Ephemeris; the Malayalam names follow the Rashtriya Panchang’s Malayalam edition.
• D. Cross, astronomy-engine (MIT licence): the positions of the Sun and the Moon and the searches for sunrise and sunset.
• GeoNames (CC BY 4.0): the towns, coordinates and time zones of the place search.

Limitations

• Temple and family almanacs can differ by a day near a boundary: a Sankranti close to three fifths of the daytime, or a nakshatram that changes just after sunrise.
• Festivals kept by temple custom on a nakshatram (Thiruvathira in Dhanu, Ashtami Rohini, temple utsavams) are not placed; every day’s naal is shown so you can find them.
• Times are for a level horizon at sea level; hills change sunrise and sunset by a few minutes.
• Years from 1900 to 2100 are supported. Where the Sun does not rise or set (near the poles) the Kerala rule cannot be applied and the civil day is used.

Privacy

Everything is calculated in your browser, and the CSV and calendar files are made there too. A town or coordinates you choose are remembered in this browser for the panchang tools; Reset forgets them.