Telugu calendar — తెలుగు పంచాంగం

The Telugu calendar (panchangam) of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana is an amanta lunar calendar: each month runs from the day after a new moon (Amavasya) to the next. The months are Chaitram, Vaishakham, Jyeshtham, Ashadham, Shravanam, Bhadrapadam, Ashvayujam, Karthikam, Margasiram, Pushyam, Magham and Phalgunam.

The year begins on Ugadi, Chaitra Shuddha Padyami. Years are counted in the Shalivahana Shaka era and, more often in speech, named from the sixty-year cycle of samvatsaras — the name printed on every Telugu almanac and read out in the panchanga shravanam on Ugadi.

Telugu usage calls the bright half Shuddha and the dark half Bahula, so a day is written like Bhadrapada Shuddha Chavithi (Vinayaka Chavithi) or Ashvayuja Bahula Tadiya (Atla Tadde). The fifteenth of the bright half is Pournami, the last of the dark half Amavasya. A tithi that meets no sunrise is skipped (kshaya); one that covers two sunrises repeats.

Some festivals follow the Sun instead: Sankranti with Bhogi and Kanuma, and Mukkoti Ekadashi, the bright-half Ekadashi of Dhanurmasam. Our dates are computed for Hyderabad's sunrise; in Visakhapatnam or Tirupati a tithi near sunrise can rarely move a day.