Dussehra (Vijayadashami)

Dussehra, also called Vijayadashami, falls on the tenth day of the bright half of the Hindu lunar month of Ashwin, immediately after the nine nights of Navratri. The festival celebrates two of the most important triumphs of good over evil in Hindu mythology — the victory of Lord Rama over the ten-headed demon king Ravana of Lanka, recounted in the epic Ramayana, and the victory of the goddess Durga over the buffalo demon Mahishasura, recounted in the Devi Mahatmya. The name Dussehra derives from the Sanskrit dasha-hara, meaning the remover of ten — a reference to Ravana's ten heads, each representing a vice such as lust, anger, attachment, greed, pride, jealousy, ego, injustice, cruelty, and selfishness.

In northern and central India, Dussehra is the climactic night of Ramlila — a ten-day theatrical reenactment of the Ramayana performed in towns and villages — culminating in the symbolic burning of towering effigies of Ravana, Meghnath, and Kumbhakarna packed with firecrackers. In southern and eastern India, the day is observed as Vijayadashami with the Ayudha Puja (worship of work tools, vehicles, and instruments), the Vidyarambham initiation of children into formal learning, and processions of richly caparisoned elephants and the Vidhana Soudha in Mysuru. Schools and businesses are blessed for the new working season ahead.

Mysuru's Dasara Mahotsava is a state festival of Karnataka with a ten-day procession featuring the famous Mysore Palace illuminated by ninety-seven thousand light bulbs and the Jamboo Savari procession of caparisoned elephants carrying the goddess Chamundeshwari's idol on a golden howdah. Kullu Dussehra in Himachal Pradesh extends for seven additional days after the main festival with a procession of over two hundred local deities. Bastar Dussehra in Chhattisgarh is the longest in India at seventy-five days. Bengali Bisarjan involves the immersion of Durga idols in rivers and seas. The southern Vidyarambham initiation in Kerala has children write their first letters in rice grains under the guidance of an elder.