Satyanarayan Katha (Online)

About this puja

Satyanarayan Katha is the most familiar household puja in north India. Vishnu is worshipped as Satyanarayan, the Lord of Truth, and the katha (story) is read aloud: the poor Brahmin, the woodcutter, the merchant and his family, and the king who refused and repented. The stories are told in the Reva Khanda of the Skanda Purana and in the Bhavishya Purana, and their message is simple: keep your word to the Lord and share his prasad. Families hold the katha to give thanks after a wedding, a birth, a new home, a recovery or a success, and to ask for well-being before a new chapter. It is a joyful puja, open to everyone in the household, with no fasting rule and no restriction of caste or gender.

Doing it on the banks of the Ganga adds a special sweetness. Haridwar is where the river leaves the hills for the plains, and Rishikesh sits a little upstream among the ashrams. A katha held at a riverside ghat, with the Ganga flowing beside the kalash, is something many families who live far away long for. For NRI families, and for elders who can no longer travel, our online katha brings that riverside to the phone screen.

How the online puja works: you send the names of the family members and your gotra. The priest takes sankalp in those names, performs the Satyanarayan puja with the kalash, Ganesh and Navagraha invocation, reads the full katha and performs the aarti. You and your relatives can join live from different cities, and the recording is sent after. The prasad, the moli (sacred thread) and the sankalp sheet are couriered to your Indian address.

Who performs it

The katha is read by Haridwar and Rishikesh priests whom we work with regularly for our yatra groups. They are local, ghat-associated pandits; they are not employees of any temple or ghat committee, and we do not claim this service is run on behalf of any temple.

Good to know before you book

• The puja is performed at a riverside ghat or in a Ganga-side ashram hall, depending on the season and the time of day. In the monsoon (roughly July to September) the ghats are often under water and the hall is used.
• Purnima (full moon) is the most popular day, and many families also choose Ekadashi, Sankranti or a family occasion such as a birthday or anniversary. The puja can in fact be done on any day.
• The full katha with puja and aarti usually takes around two to three hours.
• If you would like the katha read in a language other than Hindi (for example Marathi or Gujarati), ask at the time of booking; this depends on which priest is available.
• Prasad (panjiri or sheera style dry sweet, moli, kumkum and the sankalp sheet) is couriered within India. For addresses abroad only non-perishable items can be sent, at extra cost.
• A tulsi leaf is traditionally placed in the prasad; if a family member is allergic or you keep a particular diet, tell us and the priest will adjust what is sent.