Most Hindu festivals move around the Gregorian calendar every year because they follow tithi, a lunar measurement. Makar Sankranti and Pongal are the exception, and understanding why helps explain a pattern you may have noticed.
A solar festival, not a lunar one
Makar Sankranti marks the Sun’s transit into Capricorn (Makar rashi), a solar event, not a lunar one. Because the solar year is close to the fixed 365.25-day Gregorian year, the date stays close to January 14 almost every year, drifting only very slowly over centuries, unlike lunar festivals which can shift by weeks.
Why this matters if you live abroad
Since the date barely moves, families in the US, UK, or anywhere else can rely on “around January 14” every year without needing to check a fresh calendar the way they would for a lunar festival, whose date can shift by weeks depending on where you are. The exact clock-time of the solar transit still varies slightly, but the calendar date itself is stable.
Regional names, same underlying event
Pongal in Tamil Nadu, Makar Sankranti in most of North India, Uttarayan in Gujarat, and Bihu in Assam are regional names and rituals attached to the same solar transit.
Why the date still creeps, slowly
The date isn’t perfectly fixed forever. Because of the precession of the equinoxes, Makar Sankranti has drifted from around January 12 a century ago to January 14 or 15 today, and it will keep creeping forward by roughly one day every 70 to 80 years. This is also why some panchang sources list January 14 and others list January 15 for the same year: the exact moment of the Sun’s transit can fall just before or just after midnight depending on time zone, which pushes the observed date a day later for some locations without it being an error on anyone’s part.
What families abroad actually adapt
The puja and the food stay close to tradition: making pongal or kheer, offering it first, visiting a temple if one is nearby. What changes is the outdoor element. Kite flying, a huge part of Uttarayan celebrations in Gujarat where January is mild and sunny, doesn’t translate to a January in Chicago or Toronto with snow on the ground, so many families move that piece to a warmer month or skip it. Community events at temples or cultural centers often get scheduled for the nearest weekend to boost turnout, but the actual puja observed at home tends to stay on the correct solar date itself rather than moving to match the community event.
A quick way to spot the drift yourself
If you have old family calendars or diaries going back a few decades, this is easy to see firsthand: a calendar from the 1980s will typically mark Makar Sankranti on January 13 or 14, while a modern one marks it on January 14 or 15. Neither is wrong, they’re both accurately reflecting the Sun’s actual transit for that specific year, just decades apart on a scale where the shift is slow enough to be invisible year to year but obvious across a generation. It’s a rare case in the Hindu calendar where an old family calendar and this year’s panchang can genuinely disagree by a day without either one being an error.
Check the exact time
For the precise moment of transit and that day’s panchang, use the panchang page with your city selected.