व्रत · Vrat & Vrat Katha
Solah Somwar Vrat
सोलह सोमवार व्रत
Sixteen Mondays of devotion to Lord Shiva — for marriage, wishes, and unbroken dharma
- When
- Sixteen consecutive Mondays
- सोलह लगातार सोमवार
- Deity
- Lord Shiva (with Mata Parvati)
- भगवान शिव (माता पार्वती सहित)
- Purpose
- For unmarried girls — finding a suitable spouse. For married couples — marital bliss and long life. For all — fulfilment of a heartfelt wish
About this vrat
Solah Somwar Vrat (सोलह सोमवार व्रत) is observed on sixteen consecutive Mondays in devotion to Lord Shiva. It is among the most ancient of the Monday-vrat traditions, with references in the Skanda Purana (Kashi Khand) and in the broader Shiva-bhakti tradition that flowered through the medieval bhakti movement. Across north India — particularly in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and the Hindi-speaking belt — Solah Somwar is the vrat young women keep when they wish for a good marriage; it is the vrat married women keep for their husband's long life; and it is the vrat any devotee keeps when they hold a sankalpa they wish Shiva to grant.
The vrat is rooted in the original Shiva tapasya — Goddess Parvati's own observance of austerity to win Shiva as her husband. Parvati's tapasya, recounted in the Shiva Purana and the Kumarasambhava of Kalidasa, is the archetype of every Solah Somwar: a determined, sustained, sixteen-Monday devotion in which the wish is held as a quiet flame and the offering is austerity itself. Whoever keeps Solah Somwar walks in Parvati's footsteps; whoever completes the sixteenth Monday with the udyapan has, in some small way, reenacted her tapasya.
The form of the vrat is gentle but disciplined: a single phalahar meal, an abhishek of the Shiva Linga, sixteen offerings of bilva (bel) leaves, and the recitation of the Solah Somwar Vrat Katha. White is the colour of the day — white flowers, white clothes, white sweets. Bilva, bhang (in Shaiva tradition where used), datura, sandalwood paste, and pure water from the Ganga (or a sacred river) form the abhishek substances. The Mahamrityunjaya and Panchakshari mantras are recited; many also read the Shiva Sahasranama.
Solah Somwar Vrat — Katha
The legendary story recited as part of the vrat. Read aloud during the morning puja.
The Solah Somwar Vrat Katha is the story of a merchant's son who lived in a small town on the banks of a sacred river. The young man was born to wealthy parents but was wayward by nature — he gambled, drank, and neglected his duties; the family's prosperity began to slip; his parents grew older and weaker, and yet the son did not change.
One evening, after losing a great sum at gambling, the young man wandered to a small Shiva temple at the edge of the town — not from devotion but from despair. He sat on the temple steps, weeping at his own ruin. An old sannyasi who had been worshipping inside the temple came out, sat beside him, and asked him to share his trouble.
The young man poured out everything — his gambling, his addiction, his parents' decline, the slow dissolution of every good thing in his life. The old sannyasi listened without interrupting. When the young man had finished, the sannyasi said: "Son, what you are calling your ruin is not your ruin. What is happening is the consequence of your forgetting Shiva. You have forgotten what holds you, and so what holds you has begun to slip from you. Observe the Solah Somwar Vrat. For sixteen Mondays in a row, come to this Shiva temple before sunrise, bathe in the river, perform abhishek of the Shiva Linga with water and bilva, take only one meal of phalahar through the day, and recite the katha as I will teach you. On the sixteenth Monday, perform the udyapan by feeding sixteen brahmins kheer and giving them small gifts. If you do this, every door that has closed against you will open."
The young man, in his despair, agreed. The first Monday he came reluctantly — he hated the cold dawn, the fast made him irritable, and the puja seemed pointless. The second Monday he came because the sannyasi had said he should. By the fourth Monday, he found that something in his heart had begun to settle; he had not gambled in two weeks; his parents had begun to smile again. By the eighth Monday, he had taken up honest work; his old companions, finding him changed, had gradually stopped coming around. By the twelfth Monday, his work had begun to prosper; he had paid off his old debts; his marriage proposal had been received from a respectable family. On the sixteenth Monday, he performed the udyapan in full, feeding sixteen brahmins, giving daan, and prostrating himself in gratitude before the Shiva Linga where he had wept on the very first day.
But here the katha takes a turn that distinguishes Solah Somwar from a simple wish-fulfilment story. The young man, now married and prosperous, gradually forgot the discipline that had restored him. He stopped his weekly Monday observance. Within a year, the old habits began to creep back — a gambling debt here, a missed family obligation there. His new wife, herself a devotee of Shiva, watched him with quiet concern. She did not scold him; instead, she herself began Solah Somwar, holding a silent sankalpa for her husband's restoration to dharma.
By her sixteenth Monday, the young man had, of his own accord, returned to the small Shiva temple by the river. He wept again on the steps; he asked Shiva again for restoration; and this time he resolved that he would not forget. From that day, the young couple kept a weekly Monday observance — not the sixteen-Monday vrat but a simple weekly devotion — and the household, anchored in that small steady act, became a place of dharmic stability. Children were born; prosperity returned; the parents lived long and dignified; the young man himself, in old age, became the local sannyasi-figure to whom the next generation came for counsel.
The katha ends with the moral that Solah Somwar is not just a vrat for getting what you want — it is a vrat for becoming what you should be. Whoever observes it with a clear sankalpa receives Shiva's grace; but whoever continues a small weekly Monday devotion long after the vrat has ended walks through life on the path Shiva himself walks — the path of austerity, surrender, and unbroken dharma.
Vrat Vidhi — How to observe
- Choose sixteen consecutive Mondays. Begin on any Monday — Mondays in Sawan (Shravan) are especially auspicious for Shiva-vrat traditions, but any month is acceptable. Hold a clear sankalpa from the first Monday and do not break it through all sixteen.
- Monday morning bath and abhishek. Wake before sunrise. Bathe in flowing water if possible (river, well, otherwise home bath with Ganga jal added). Wear white or saffron clothes. Visit a Shiva temple, or set up a Shiva Linga at home on a small chowki.
- The abhishek. Perform abhishek of the Shiva Linga with — in this order — pure water, then milk, then water again, then a small offering of curd, ghee, honey, and finally water again (panchamrita). Place sixteen bilva (bel) leaves on the Linga, one at a time, with the mantra "Om Namah Shivaya".
- Offerings. Apply a tilak of bhasma (sacred ash) and chandan (sandalwood paste) on the Linga. Offer white flowers (especially datura, where available), unbroken rice (akshat), incense, and a ghee lamp.
- Recite the katha. Read the Solah Somwar Vrat Katha aloud. Follow with the Mahamrityunjaya mantra and the Panchakshari mantra ("Om Namah Shivaya"), each recited 108 times.
- Phalahar meal. Take only one meal during the day, typically before sunset. The meal should be sattvik phalahar — fruits, milk, sabudana khichdi, kuttu (buckwheat), singhare ka atta (water-chestnut flour), boiled aloo with sendha namak (rock salt). No grains, no onion, no garlic, no meat, no alcohol.
- Bhog and prasad. Offer kheer (rice and milk pudding, or sabudana kheer) at the Shiva Linga. After the puja, distribute it as prasad — first to family members, then to the household.
- Repeat for sixteen Mondays. Hold the same sankalpa each Monday. If a Monday is missed by accident, add one extra Monday at the end so the count of sixteen is unbroken.
Mantras
ॐ नमः शिवाय
Om Namah Shivaya
Salutations to Shiva. (The Panchakshari Mantra, the heart of Shaiva bhakti.)
ॐ त्र्यम्बकं यजामहे सुगन्धिं पुष्टिवर्धनम् । उर्वारुकमिव बन्धनान्मृत्योर्मुक्षीय मामृतात् ॥
Om Tryambakam Yajamahe Sugandhim Pushti-Vardhanam · Urvarukamiva Bandhanaan Mrityormukshiya Maamritat
We worship the three-eyed Shiva, the fragrant one who nourishes all. As a ripe cucumber is freed from its stem, so may we be freed from the bondage of death — towards immortality, but not from immortality. (The Mahamrityunjaya Mantra.)
Aarti
ॐ जय शिव ओंकारा, स्वामी जय शिव ओंकारा । ब्रह्मा, विष्णु, सदाशिव, अर्द्धांगी धारा ॥ एकानन चतुरानन पंचानन राजे । हंसासन गरुड़ासन वृषवाहन साजे ॥ दो भुज चार चतुर्भुज दशभुज ते सोहैं । तीनों रूप निरखता त्रिभुवन-जन मोहैं ॥ अक्षमाला वनमाला रुण्डमाला धारी । चन्दन मृगमद सोहै भाले शशिधारी ॥ श्वेताम्बर पीताम्बर बाघम्बर अंगे । सनकादिक गरुड़ादिक भूतादिक संगे ॥ कर के मध्य कमंडलु चक्र त्रिशूलधर्ता । जगकर्ता जगहर्ता जगपालनकर्ता ॥ ब्रह्मा-विष्णु-सदाशिव जानत अविवेका । प्रणवाक्षर के मध्ये ये तीनों एका ॥ त्रिगुणस्वामी जी की आरती जो कोई नर गावै । कहत शिवानन्द स्वामी मनवाँछित फल पावै ॥
Udyapan — The concluding ceremony
After the sixteenth Monday, perform the udyapan as follows:
— Begin the morning with a full bath in flowing water (or with Ganga jal at home). Visit a Shiva temple if one is available, or set up an elaborate Shiva Linga at home with a clean white cloth, fresh flowers, and a multi-bilva mala.
— Perform a complete Rudrabhishek if possible — a sixteen-substance abhishek including water, milk, curd, ghee, honey, sugar, panchamrita, sandalwood paste, rosewater, and finally pure water. Recite the Sri Rudram (or the Rudri Path) where available.
— Invite sixteen brahmins (or, in modern observance, sixteen members of the community regardless of caste) to the home. Wash their feet with respect, apply tilak and akshat, and serve them a feast of kheer, halwa, puri, and sabzi prepared with sattvik ingredients.
— Give each brahmin a small dakshina (gift) — a piece of clothing, a steel utensil, or a small money envelope according to your means.
— Light a special diya before the Shiva Linga and silently complete the sankalpa with which you began sixteen Mondays ago. Thank Shiva and Parvati for whatever has been granted; surrender any remaining anxiety; resolve to continue at least a small weekly Monday observance through the rest of the year.
— Many devotees also visit a Jyotirlinga or other major Shiva temple within a few weeks of the udyapan as a thanksgiving pilgrimage. Where this is not possible, a longer Monday tapasya in the home — by lighting a special diya every Monday for the rest of the year — closes the vrat in the spirit of the katha.
Frequently asked questions
What is Solah Somwar Vrat?
Solah Somwar Vrat is a sixteen-Monday vrat dedicated to Lord Shiva, traditionally observed for marriage (by unmarried women), marital bliss (by married couples), or any heartfelt sankalpa. Each Monday involves a pre-dawn bath, abhishek of the Shiva Linga with water and bilva leaves, recitation of the Solah Somwar Vrat Katha, and a single phalahar meal.
Can men observe Solah Somwar Vrat?
Yes. While the vrat is most associated with women — particularly unmarried women observing it for a good marriage — it is observed by men, married couples, and entire families. The sankalpa changes with the observer's situation: men typically keep it for career stability, family wellbeing, or a specific spiritual outcome.
Can Solah Somwar Vrat be done in any month?
Yes, the vrat can begin on any Monday. Mondays during the month of Sawan (Shravan) — typically July–August — are especially auspicious for any Shiva-related vrat, and many observers begin Solah Somwar on the first Monday of Sawan. But the vrat is valid in any month; only the count of sixteen consecutive Mondays must be unbroken.
What can be eaten during Solah Somwar Vrat?
The vrat permits a single phalahar (sattvik) meal during the day. Acceptable foods include: fruits, milk, dry fruits, sabudana khichdi, kuttu (buckwheat) puri, singhare ka atta dishes, boiled potatoes with sendha namak (rock salt). Avoided: grains (rice, wheat, dal), onion, garlic, meat, alcohol, table salt.
What if a Monday is missed during Solah Somwar Vrat?
If a Monday is missed accidentally (illness, travel, monthly cycle), add one extra Monday at the end so the unbroken count of sixteen is completed. If broken deliberately (chose to skip it), traditional teaching is to begin the entire vrat again from the first Monday with renewed sankalpa.
What is the udyapan of Solah Somwar Vrat?
The udyapan involves a complete Rudrabhishek of the Shiva Linga with sixteen substances, the recitation of Sri Rudram where possible, and the feeding of sixteen brahmins (or community members) with a feast of kheer, halwa, puri and sabzi. Each is given a small dakshina. The sankalpa is silently completed before the Linga and many devotees follow with a pilgrimage to a Jyotirlinga.