Navratri Puja Essentials

Navratri puja begins with ghatasthapana on the first morning, when a kalash is set up and barley is sown in a bowl of earth beside it. Many homes then keep an akhand jyoti, a lamp that burns without going out for all nine days, alongside the morning and evening aarti. This section of our Navratri range covers what the altar needs.

Lamp ghee is prepared for diyas and deepams. It gives a clean, steady flame, but it is not for edible use, so keep it on a different shelf from the kitchen ghee and never cook with it. For ghee to eat, go to pure ghee. Some families light their lamps with pure cow ghee from the kitchen, and many South Indian homes use sesame oil for the evening deepam, so the choice follows your own custom.

Brass and clay diyas, cotton wicks and the everyday items for daily worship sit in our wider pooja essentials shelf. On Ashtami or Navami, kanya puja closes the festival in many North Indian homes, with young girls served halwa, puri and black chana, and the sugar, jaggery and dried fruit for that meal are in Navratri sweets.

For an akhand jyoti, choose a deep lamp with a long wick and set it on a metal plate, away from curtains and draughts. Top up the ghee before the level falls below the wick, and keep a second wick ready so the flame can pass from one to the other.