Bhai Dooj

About Bhai Dooj

Significance

Bhai Dooj, also called Yama Dwitiya and Bhratri Dwitiya, closes the five days of Diwali on the second day of the bright half of Kartika. It celebrates the bond of brothers and sisters: sisters honour their brothers with a tilak and a meal and pray for their long life and welfare, and brothers in turn give gifts and promise their support.

Its story concerns Yama, the lord of death, and his twin sister Yamuna (Yami), children of the Sun. Long pressed by Yamuna to visit her, Yama came to her home on this day, was welcomed, fed and honoured, and in return declared that a brother who eats at his sister’s home on this Dwitiya would be free from the fear of untimely death. Verses telling this, attributed to the Puranas, are quoted in the Dharmashastra digests under Kartika Shukla Dwitiya, and Kayastha communities also keep the day as Chitragupta Puja, for Yama’s scribe.

How and where it is observed

The festival is kept throughout India and Nepal under many names: Bhai Dooj or Bhaiya Dooj in the Hindi-speaking north, Bhau Beej in Maharashtra, Goa and Karnataka, Bhai Phonta or Bhai Phota in Bengal, and Bhai Tika in Nepal, where it is the last day of Tihar. At Mathura brothers and sisters bathe together in the Yamuna at Vishram Ghat, a custom tied to Yama’s visit to his sister.

Rituals

The sister prepares a plate with roli or sandalwood paste, rice, a lamp and sweets, applies the tilak to her brother’s forehead, performs aarti and feeds him, often a full meal she has cooked. In Bengal the phonta is made of sandalwood paste, kohl and curd and is accompanied by a traditional rhyme; in Nepal the tika has seven colours and the brother is garlanded with long-lasting makhamali flowers. Brothers give gifts, and where a sister lives far away the greeting is sent or the tilak is applied by a cousin.

How the date is fixed

Bhai Dooj is Kartika Shukla Dwitiya, the same month in both reckonings, usually two days after Diwali. The traditional time for the tilak and the meal is the Aparahna, the fourth of the five parts of the daytime, so the Dwitiya must prevail in the Aparahna. If it covers part of the Aparahna on two days, the day with the greater coverage is taken; if on neither, the day on which Dwitiya prevails longest. Bengali almanacs fix Bhai Phonta by their own reckoning and can differ by a day.

Sources

• Nirnaya Sindhu, Kartika-masa: Yama Dwitiya (Bhratri Dwitiya)
• Dharma Sindhu, Pariccheda 2, Kartika: Yama Dwitiya
• Encyclopaedia Britannica: Bhai Dooj

Customs differ between regions, communities and families; this description is background, not a prescription. The date above is calculated by the rule shown on this page.