What Is Diwali, the Festival of Lights?

The name comes from a word meaning a row of lamps, and the lighting of small oil lamps called diyas is the central image of the festival. The general theme is light overcoming darkness and knowledge overcoming ignorance.

There is no single story behind Diwali. In many Hindu communities it celebrates the return of Rama to Ayodhya after years of exile, welcomed home by lamps lining the streets. In others it honours the goddess Lakshmi, or celebrates Krishna's victory over a demon. Which story is central depends on region and tradition.

Diwali is usually spread over five days, each with its own character:

• •Homes are cleaned and decorated, and metal or household goods are bought
• •Lamps and rangoli patterns are set out at doorways
• •The main night of Diwali, with lamps, prayers and fireworks
• •A day marking family and community bonds
• •A day celebrating the bond between brothers and sisters

Homes are cleaned thoroughly beforehand, which is both practical and symbolic. Coloured rangoli patterns are made on floors and doorsteps, often with rice flour or petals. Lamps are placed along walls and windows.

Food is central, particularly sweets shared with neighbours and relatives. New clothes are common, gifts are exchanged, and in many places fireworks are set off, though several cities have restricted these because of air quality concerns.

Sikhs mark Bandi Chhor Divas at the same time, remembering the release of Guru Hargobind and other prisoners from imprisonment. Jains commemorate the liberation of Mahavira. Some Buddhist communities also observe the period.

This overlap is worth knowing. Diwali, the festival of lights, is not a single event with one meaning but a shared season observed by several traditions, each holding onto its own story while sharing the lamps.

Diwali is a public holiday in India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Malaysia, Fiji, Trinidad and Tobago, Mauritius and several other countries, reflecting where Indian communities settled over the last two centuries.

Large celebrations now take place in cities including London, Toronto, Sydney and New York, often organised publicly and attended well beyond the Hindu community. As with many religious festivals that travel, this raises ongoing questions within those communities about the balance between a religious observance and a broader cultural event, and different families answer it differently.

Diwali does not have a fixed date on the calendar most countries use for daily life. It follows the Hindu lunisolar calendar, which tracks the phases of the Moon while also staying roughly aligned with the seasons. The main night of Diwali falls on a new moon, the darkest night of its lunar month, which gives the lamps an obvious symbolic power. In the everyday calendar, this usually lands somewhere in October or November.

For some communities, Diwali also marks a new beginning in practical terms. In parts of western India, the day after the main celebration is observed as the start of a new year. Many business families, especially traders, have traditionally closed their old account books and blessed new ones at this time, linking the festival to Lakshmi, the goddess associated with wealth and good fortune. Cleaning the home before the festival fits the same idea of welcoming a fresh start.

The same five days can feel quite different from region to region. In much of south India, the day before the main night, Naraka Chaturdashi, carries special weight. Families rise before dawn for a ritual oil bath, marking Krishna's defeat of the demon Narakasura, and fireworks often begin in the early morning. In Bengal and parts of eastern India, the new-moon night itself is celebrated mainly as Kali Puja, honouring the goddess Kali with night-long worship, lamps and large public images, while Lakshmi is often worshipped on a different date.

The day after the main night has its own customs in many northern and western areas. Govardhan Puja recalls a story in which the young Krishna lifts Govardhan hill to shelter villagers and their cattle from storms sent by the god Indra. Temples and families prepare the Annakut, literally a mountain of food, offering dozens of dishes before sharing them. Because these customs vary so much, asking someone how their family celebrates Diwali usually brings a more interesting answer than assuming one standard version.

A traditional diya is a small cup of fired clay, filled with ghee or a vegetable oil such as mustard or sesame oil, with a twisted cotton wick resting on its lip. Families often buy or paint new diyas each year and set them in rows along doorsteps, windowsills, balconies and rooftops. On the main night many households keep lamps burning late, and some draw small footprints leading into the house as a sign of welcome for Lakshmi. Electric strings of lights are now common too, but the clay lamp remains the festival's emblem.

Rangoli designs are made by trickling coloured powder, rice flour, sand or flower petals between the fingers onto the floor, often starting from a central point and building outwards in symmetrical patterns. Lotus flowers, which are associated with Lakshmi, lamps and geometric shapes are popular motifs. In south India a related form called kolam is drawn in white rice flour, in many homes as a daily practice rather than only at festivals, and the flour is sometimes described as an offering that also feeds ants and birds. Like the lamps, the designs are temporary, swept away and made again.

For many Hindus in northern India, Diwali completes a story that runs through the whole autumn festival season. In the Ramayana epic, Prince Rama is sent into exile in the forest for fourteen years, accompanied by his wife Sita and his brother Lakshmana. Ravana, the demon king of Lanka, abducts Sita, and Rama searches for her with the help of Hanuman, the monkey devotee, and an army of allies. After a great battle Rama defeats Ravana, rescues Sita and returns home to Ayodhya, where the people light rows of lamps to welcome him.

The calendar follows the story. In the weeks before Diwali, many towns stage the Ram Lila, a dramatised retelling of the epic performed over several nights. It ends on Dussehra, also called Vijayadashami, when tall effigies of Ravana, often packed with fireworks, are burned to mark the victory of good over evil, often alongside effigies of his brother Kumbhakarna and his son Meghnad. Diwali falls about twenty days later, marking the homecoming. Ayodhya itself now holds a lamp festival on the banks of the Sarayu river, where volunteers light more than a million diyas, a scale recognised by world record keepers.

Diwali, the festival of lights, spans five days and several religious traditions, and its shared image of small lamps pushing back the dark is what makes it recognisable around the world.