Shigmotsav or-Shigmo

Shigmotsav is basically a festival of masses wherein people in different villages dress up beautifully and rejoice in the merrymaking of the festival. There is song on every lip as the group of people dance their ways to the temple. The highlight of the festival is the Rang Panchami during which people throw gulal (red colour) at each other.

In Goa, the festival of Shigmotsav starts with ‘Naman’, when the villagers offer a complete obeisance from the 9th moon day to the full moon day and abstain from any kind of non vegetarian food or intoxicants. It is from the 11th to the 15th moon day when the villagers dress themselves in colorful clothes and celebrate the different hues of spring by displaying multi colored cloths, torans, flags and red ‘Dwajas’. They beat their drums and play the flutes to add music to the whole colorful ambience. The 5th day is the ‘Rang-Panchami’ when everyone celebrates with ‘Gulal’ or red colored powder and throw the color at it each other to greet the coming of spring.

The time for celebrating the Shigmotsav Festival in Goa is during the month of March.It is the festival of farewell to winter celebrated on the full moon day in the month of Phalguna (March), the last month of the Hindu calendar.