Thai Pusam 2027 Date

About Thai Pusam

Thaipusam marks the day Parvati gave Murugan the Vel — a spear that stands for the piercing of ignorance, not just the slaying of the asura Surapadman. Held on Pushya star in the Tamil month of Thai, it is famous for kavadi-bearers walking in silence to hill shrines like Palani.

The kavadi tradition comes from the story of Idumban, a disciple of Sage Agastya. Agastya asked him to carry two hills — Shivagiri and Shaktigiri — slung on a pole across his shoulders. Halfway through the journey the hills became immovable, because a small boy (Murugan in disguise) had claimed them. Idumban fought the boy, was killed, and then revived as Murugan's chief devotee. Every kavadi today re-enacts that pole and burden. The items inside carry meaning of their own: a milk pot for purity, turmeric for debts being shed, ghee for letting go, sour milk for sickness handed over. At Palani — the third of Murugan's six Padai Veedu — devotees climb the hill to Dandayudhapani, a navabashana (nine-herb amalgam) idol of the renunciate Murugan, sculpted by the siddha Bhogar.