Hartalika Teej (14 September): Vrat Vidhi, Puja Window and Why Some Calendars Say the 13th
Monday, 14 September 2026 is Hartalika Teej — the nirjala fast kept for Parvati and Shiva. The morning puja window is unusually short this year, and here is why some calendars print the 13th instead.
Monday, 14 September 2026 is Hartalika Teej — Tritiya of Bhadrapada Shukla Paksha, and the most demanding of the three Teej vrats. Where Hariyali Teej is kept with fruit and Kajari Teej with a single meal, Hartalika is nirjala: no food and no water, from sunrise until the puja is completed the following morning.
Why some calendars print 13 September
This is worth settling before anything else, because the two dates are genuinely in circulation this year. The Tritiya tithi begins at 07:08 on 13 September and ends at 07:06 on 14 September. On the 13th it starts about an hour after sunrise, which means the 13th rises under Dwitiya, not Tritiya. On the 14th, Tritiya is running at sunrise (06:06) and holds for the first hour of the day.
Hartalika Teej follows the udaya-tithi rule — the tithi present at sunrise is the one that owns the day — so the vrat belongs to 14 September. Calendars that place it on the 13th are counting the hours the tithi covers rather than the sunrise it touches. If your family has always followed one particular panchang, follow it; the fast is not invalidated by the disagreement.
The puja window on 14 September
The pratahkal (early morning) division of the day runs 06:06 to 08:34. But Tritiya itself ends at 07:06, so the sankalp and the main puja are best completed in that first hour after sunrise, 06:06 to 07:06 — a genuinely narrow window this year, narrower than most.
Two other timings for the day: sunrise is 06:06 and sunset 18:26, and Rahu Kaal falls 07:39 to 09:11. Note that if you finish the puja before 07:06 as recommended, you are clear of Rahu Kaal entirely — the two do not overlap. The nakshatra through the day is Chitra.
Vrat vidhi
- Bathe before sunrise and wear unstitched or new clothes — green and red are traditional for Teej.
- Make the murtis by hand from clean river sand or clay: a Shivling, and figures of Parvati and Ganesha. Hartalika is one of the few vrats where the images are made fresh each year rather than kept.
- Take the sankalp — the formal statement of intent to keep the fast without food or water.
- Offer the sixteen shringar items to Parvati: bangles, bindi, sindoor, kajal, mehendi, a comb, mirror, and the rest. This is the heart of the puja; the shringar is what is being asked for and offered at the same time.
- Offer bel patra, dhatura and white flowers to the Shivling, and durva to Ganesha.
- Read or listen to the Hartalika vrat katha, then perform aarti.
- Keep the night in vigil where the household observes it — bhajans, and the katha read again at each of the night watches.
- Break the fast the next morning, after the concluding puja.
The story the name comes from
Parvati had set her mind on Shiva and was performing severe penance to win him. Her father Himalaya, meanwhile, had promised her to Vishnu. Hearing this, her friend — her sakhi — carried her away to a forest cave so the marriage could not take place. The name records exactly that: harat, taken away, and alika, the female friend. In the cave, Parvati made a Shivling from sand and kept a fast without food or water until Shiva appeared and accepted her. The women who keep this vrat are repeating her fast, with the same sand Shivling and the same terms.
Who keeps it
Hartalika Teej is kept by women — married women for the long life and wellbeing of their husbands, and unmarried girls asking for a husband of their own choosing rather than one chosen for them, which is precisely what Parvati was asking for. It is observed most widely across Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra. In many families the vrat, once taken, is kept every year for life.