A Complete Guide to Bihu: History, Rituals and Traditional Foods

If you ask anyone in Assam when Bihu is celebrated, you will probably be asked a question in return: which one?

While most festivals happen once a year, there are three Bihus celebrated annually. One is noisy and happy in springtime, another is serene in autumn, and one more is well-fed in winter. All three are tied to the growth and cultivation of the paddy plant at different stages.

This relationship with the paddy field is the key to understanding almost everything about Bihu: the time of its celebration, the prayers, the food and even the music. Here we describe all three celebrations in detail, along with their origin and practices.

Where the word “Bihu” comes from

No one knows for certain. Bihu is said to derive from the Deori language word bisu, meaning great happiness. According to a Chutia folk explanation, the name is related to the time of ahu rice cultivation and the singing and dancing at night by the farmers who guarded the fields.

These explanations are not in competition with each other, since Bihu has been shaped over centuries by the different peoples of Assam.

A short history

Bihu is an ancient festival. The earliest known reference to it is in a copper plate document from 1401 AD, in which the Chutia king Lakshminarayan gave land as charity to a Brahmin on the day of Bihu. According to the Ahom-period chronicle known as the Deodhai Buranji, there was an attack on Sadiya in 1524 on the first day of Bihu celebrations.

You may also come across stories that the Ahom king Rudra Singha invited Bihu dancers to perform in front of his Rang Ghar pavilion in Sivasagar. It is an appealing tale, but many historians doubt it. The Ahom court chronicles, or Buranjis, say nothing about Bihu performances at the Rang Ghar, which was a place where buffalo fights, cockfights and wrestling were watched. It is safest to treat the link between royalty and the Bihu dance as folk belief rather than established fact.

There is no doubt, however, that Bihu began in the villages among farming communities before it found its way to the courts. It still keeps much of its village flavour, even on Guwahati’s crowded stages.

Rongali Bihu (Bohag Bihu): the spring festival

Rongali means joy, and this is the best-known Bihu outside Assam. It is celebrated in mid-April, usually around 14 or 15 April, at the start of the Assamese month of Bohag. This is the Assamese New Year and the beginning of the sowing season. The celebrations traditionally last for about seven days, and each day has its own significance.

Goru Bihu: the day of the cattle

The festival opens on the last day of the old year with Goru Bihu, the day of the cattle. Cows and bullocks are the farmer’s partners in the field, so they come first. In the morning they are taken to a river or pond, washed and rubbed with a paste of turmeric and black gram (mah-halodhi). Pieces of bottle gourd and brinjal are tossed at them, along with a traditional rhyme wishing them health and strength. In the evening they get new ropes and are allowed to roam freely for the day.

It is a small, practical ritual, and a telling one. Before the family celebrates itself, it thanks the animals that make the harvest possible.

Manuh Bihu: the human New Year

The next day, the first of Bohag, is Manuh Bihu, the Bihu of people. Families bathe early and wear new clothes. Younger people touch the feet of their elders and give them a bihuwan, a gift that is usually a gamosa, the white handwoven cloth with red borders that you will see everywhere in Assam. Relatives visit one another, and nobody leaves a house without being fed.

Husori and the Bihu dance

Over the next few days, groups of men known as husori move from house to house in the village. After announcing their arrival with drums, they sing Bihu songs in the courtyard, dance in a circle and bless the household for the coming year. In return, the family gives them betel leaf and areca nut, as well as some money.

The Bihu dance is swift and energetic, with sharp movements of the hips and wrists to the beat of the dhol (two-sided drum), the pepa (a pipe made from buffalo horn), the gogona (a small bamboo instrument played against the teeth), the toka (split bamboo clapper) and taal (cymbals). Young women traditionally dance in mekhela chador, often in golden muga silk, with flowers in their hair.

In April 2023, the dance entered the Guinness World Records when more than 11,000 dancers and musicians came together at Sarusajai Stadium in Guwahati.

Kongali Bihu (Kati Bihu): the quiet one

Six months later, around mid-October, comes a completely different Bihu. Kongali means poor or lacking, and the name fits. In the month of Kati, the paddy fields are green but the crop is not yet ready, and the previous year’s grain is running low in many homes. There is not much to enjoy, and a lot to worry about.

Kati Bihu is therefore a festival of prayers and lamps, not dance. In the evening, clay lamps called saki are lit at the foot of the tulsi plant in the courtyard, at the granary, in the kitchen garden and even in the paddy fields. Some families light a tall lamp called the akash banti on a bamboo pole, said to guide the souls of their ancestors. In places, farmers whirl a bamboo stick in the fields while chanting, to ward off pests.

It is a peaceful evening. In many ways it is the most honest of the three Bihus: a reminder that a harvest is never guaranteed until it is in the granary.

Bhogali Bihu (Magh Bihu): the festival of plenty

By mid-January, the harvest is complete. The granaries are full, the fields are bare and the worries of Kati have gone. Bhogali comes from bhog, meaning enjoyment or feasting, and that is what this festival is about.

Uruka: the night before

Bhogali begins with Uruka, the last night of the month of Puh. During the day, young people build a makeshift hut of straw, bamboo and hay, called the bhelaghar, usually by a riverbank or in an open field. They also build a tall structure of firewood and hay called the meji.

On the night of Uruka, everyone gathers for a feast of fish, meat, rice and sweets.

Meji: the morning bonfire

At dawn on the first day of Magh, after a bath, people set fire to the meji. They offer pitha and betel nut to the flames and pray for a good year. Some families carry home half-burnt pieces of wood and place them at the foot of fruit trees, an old custom believed to help the trees bear fruit.

Magh Bihu is also a time for traditional games and sports in many places, such as buffalo fights, egg fights and other village contests, though some of these have been restricted in recent years.

The cuisine of Bihu

Visit an Assamese home during Bihu and you will always leave with a full stomach. Bihu food is simple but delicious, made from the same rice, sesame, coconut and jaggery that the farming year produces.

Pitha

Pitha are rice cakes, and every household has its favourites. Some of the best known are:

• Til pitha: a thin roll of sticky rice flour, cooked on a flat pan and filled with black sesame and jaggery.
• Ghila pitha: fried cakes of rice flour and jaggery, crisp outside and soft inside.
• Narikol pitha: rice flour filled with sweet grated coconut.
• Tekeli pitha: rice flour steamed over the mouth of a pot covered with cloth.

Making pitha is usually a shared activity. In many homes, women soak and pound the rice days before the festival, and the smell of roasted sesame fills the kitchen as Bihu approaches.

Laru

These are round sweets, similar to laddoos. Varieties include narikol laru, made from coconut and sugar or jaggery, and til laru, made from sesame and jaggery.

Jolpan

Jolpan is the traditional Assamese breakfast, and during Bihu it becomes a small feast. A plate might include flattened rice (chira), puffed rice (muri), popped rice (akhoi) or soft sticky rice, served with curd (doi), jaggery (gur) and sometimes cream. It is filling, cooling and easy to prepare for a house full of visitors.

Feasts and drinks

Magh Bihu is especially known for the fish and meat dishes of the Uruka feast. Many of Assam’s communities also brew their own traditional rice beer for the festival, such as apong among the Mising, suje among the Deori and nam-lao among the Tai-Ahom.

The three Bihus at a glance

	Rongali (Bohag) Bihu	Kongali (Kati) Bihu	Bhogali (Magh) Bihu
When	Mid-April	Mid-October	Mid-January
Farming stage	Sowing season begins	Crop growing, granary low	Harvest complete
Mood	Joyful, New Year	Quiet, prayerful	Feasting, community
Main customs	Goru Bihu, Manuh Bihu, husori, Bihu dance	Lamps at tulsi, granary and fields	Uruka feast, bhelaghar, meji bonfire
Typical foods	Pitha, laru, jolpan	Simple meals; pitha given to cattle	Fish, meat, pitha, laru, jolpan

Bihu today

Bihu in the city looks very different from the old days. There are countless Bihutoli stage programmes, with dance competitions and concerts filling the city with Bihu spirit, and the festival is now celebrated by Assamese people around the world.

Traditionalists feel that something vital has been lost on the stage. It is hard to keep the husori going from house to house, or the meji night, in an urban apartment. But the heart of the festival remains: gamosas given to elders, pitha cooked at home, cattle thanked before people, and lamps lit in the fields while the harvest is still uncertain. As long as there is rice in Assam, Bihu will follow the crop.

Conclusion

Bihu is really three festivals following one crop. Rongali Bihu welcomes the new year and the sowing season with dance and song, Kongali Bihu lights lamps and prays for the young paddy, and Bhogali Bihu celebrates the harvest with bonfires and feasts. Together, with their pitha, laru, jolpan, gamosas and husori songs, they tell the story of a farming year in Assam.