Attukal Pongala is a unique festival celebrated by women in Kerala. 2021 Attukal Pongala will be celebrated on Saturday 27, 2021. Attukal Pongala is a famous festival held annually at Attukal Bhagavathy Temple, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala. It is dedicated to Attukal Bhagavathy also known as Bhadrakali or Kannaki. Attukal Bhagavathy is also known as Goddess Kannaki or Bhadrakali.
Attukal Pongala is a 10-day festival that begins with the Karthigai star of the Malayalam month of Makaram or Kumbham and ends with the sacrificial offering known as Kuruthitharpanam at night. Attukal Pongala Mahotsavam is celebrated on the ninth day. Women prepare divine food from rice in clay pots and offer it to the Goddess.
The festival is marked as the largest annual gathering of women by Guinness World Records. The ceremony was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records on February 23, 1997, when 1.5 million women participated in Pongala. In 2009, a new Guinness World Record celebrated attendance by 2.5 million people.
Attukal Pongala is not only celebrated in Thiruvananthapuram, but the whole world is also waiting for the holy ceremony and every woman will pray to the Devi to bless them to be a part of it. The festival entered the Guinness Book of World Records is the largest annual gathering of women in the world in a single place on a single day irrespective of caste, creed or religion.
Pongala (literally means to boil over) is a ritualistic offering of a sweet dish consisting of rice porridge, sweet brown molasses, coconut gratings, nuts and raisins. Devotees offer Pongal to appease the presiding deity of the temple – the Goddess – popularly known as Attukal Amma.
Only women are allowed to participate in the Pongala ritual. Right from the night before the Pongala day, thousands of women, regardless of religious faith, assemble at the temple premises and on either side of the roads leading to the shrine, to make the Pongala offering. Devotees from across the country and even from abroad participate in the ritual.
Attukal Pongala Date: Saturday, February 27, 2021
Pooram Nakshathram Start on 11:18 AM on Feb 27, 2021
Pooram Nakshathram Ends on 9:36 AM on Feb 28, 2021
Attukal Pongala 2022 Highlights:
9th February – 10.50 am – Kappu Kettu & Kudiyiruthu
11th February – 8.30 am – Beginning of the Vratham of boys, Kuthiyottam Ceremony
17th February – 10.50 am – Lighting of the Pongala Hearths, 1.20 pm – Sanctification of Pongala, 7.30 pm – Chooralkuthu Ceremony, 10.30 pm – Procession of Goddess Attukal Amma.
18th February – 9.45 pm – Kappu Azhippu & Kudiyilakkal, 1.00 am – Kuruthi Tharppanam