Celebrating my birthday twice, every year
Indians are among the most migratory of the homo sapien species. We are here, there, everywhere. Keeping in touch with friends and family used to be a pain till the coming of social media. WhatsApp is the king of social media in India, and so most Indian families now have WhatsApp groups to stay connected with friends in distant countries. Still distance does make you grow apart. A day in the life of an Indian in India, has very little in common with his relative in the West. So people tend to drift further apart despite being just a phone call away.
And then one fine day, your calendar sends you a reminder that it’s your distant friend’s birthday. Relieved at having an excuse to connect with your friend, you start to text your good wishes. And then you pause as you recall that this birthday may not be their real birthday.
After all, most Indians have two birthdays.
This happens because Indian parents mark the day their children were born on the Roman calendar, as well as the local Indian calendar. Both calendars have 365 days and 12 months, but the number of days in a month in the Indian calendar varies from 29 to 32 days. So from your first birthday onwards, the day you were born on the Indian calendar will go ahead or behind the Roman calendar date. I believe the date coincides in both calendars just once in 19 years, or something like that. (The twist is Indian calendars come in many versions that vary from state to state, with a North Indian one having 354 days in a year… I don’t even want to get into that.)
Now, the date on the Indian calendar determines your star sign according to Indian traditions. Unlike the 12 star signs in the Roman calendar, the Indian calendar has 27 star signs corresponding to every day of a lunar cycle. This is why the Indian birthday is often referred to as the star birthday.
So why is the star birthday important in India?
Unlike the West where churches are going empty, crowds at places of worship in India have shot up exponentially over the last decade. In fact, it’s advisable not to travel during religious festivals in India as the roads around places of worship (which is basically everywhere) become so crowded that they have to be closed to traffic for long distances. That may explain why star birthdays also have increased in importance.
For instance, Indians choose an auspicious time and date to get married, which is decided on the star signs of the couple. Of course, not all those auspiciously married people live happily ever after. But an Indian who has faith in star signs believes it might have been much worse if the marriage was conducted at an inauspicious time. And no, I haven’t tried telling anyone that maybe, things might have been better. I don’t have a death wish!
These days, Indians who believe in the star birthday celebrate both birthdays to get the best of both worlds. Like maybe a West-style cake on the regular birthday, and a traditional Indian dish on the star birthday. What’s relevant is they appreciate receiving good wishes on their star birthday.
Knowing the star sign by itself, is not enough to identify a person’s star birthday. As a star is repeated once every lunar month, you need to know the month (in the Indian calendar) that they were born in. The chart below shows its relation with the Roman calendar.
Once you know the star and the month, you can find the corresponding day in the Roman calendar by going online, or else buying a copy of the Indian calendar which is freely available. For instance, a person born in the first month of the Indian year (Chingam in Malayalam era) under the ‘Anizham’ star sign would have their star birthday this year on August 29.
Hopefully, that helps you the next time you want to figure out the star birthday of an Indian. On second thoughts, just ask your friend’s spouse or better still the mother. It’s a lot easier, and you are less likely to go wrong!
