{"id":19362,"date":"2024-01-15T04:52:47","date_gmt":"2024-01-14T23:22:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=19362"},"modified":"2025-04-05T17:01:09","modified_gmt":"2025-04-05T11:31:09","slug":"makar-sankranti","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/makar-sankranti\/","title":{"rendered":"Makar Sankranti"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>About the Makar Sankranti<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>It marks the\u00a0Sun changing directions and shifting its trajectory towards the north, therefore, entering the Makara or Capricorn zodiac sign.<\/li>\n<li>The day is a marker for a\u00a0change of season \u2013 warmer months are close and we are moving away from winter, which is seen as a period of inactivity in many ways.<\/li>\n<li>It is said that the\u00a0northward journey of the sun (Uttarayan) begins on this day.<\/li>\n<li>Unlike most festivals that follow the lunar cycle, Makar Sankranti\u00a0follows the solar cycle and thus, is celebrated almost on the same day every year.<\/li>\n<li>Astronomically, the Earth revolves around the Sun in an elliptical orbit that requires about 365 1\/4 days to complete, as it continues to rotate on its own axis.<\/li>\n<li>The earth\u2019s spin axis is tilted with respect to its orbital plane. This, along with its distance from the Sun, determines the change in seasons for life on Earth.<\/li>\n<li>For the Northern Hemisphere, the axis points most toward the sun in June (specifically around June 21), and away from the sun around December 21.<\/li>\n<li>This corresponds to the\u00a0Winter and Summer Solstice (solstice is Latin for \u201cthe sun stands\u201d). For the Southern Hemisphere, this is reversed.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>It is also called as \u2013\n<ul>\n<li>Paush Parbon in Bengal<\/li>\n<li>Pongal\u00a0in Tamil Nadu,<\/li>\n<li>Uttarayan\u00a0in Gujarat,<\/li>\n<li>Bhogali Bihu\u00a0in Assam,<\/li>\n<li>Lohri\u00a0in Punjab and Jammu,<\/li>\n<li>Makar Sankramana\u00a0in Karnataka,<\/li>\n<li>Saen-kraat\u00a0in Kashmir.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Khichdi Parwa in parts of Bihar, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Q1) What is a solstice?<\/h3>\n<p>A solstice is an event that occurs when the Sun reaches its most northerly or southerly excursion relative to the celestial equator on the celestial sphere.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/explained\/everyday-explainers\/makar-sankranti-pongal-lohri-significance-rituals-9109065\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Makar Sankranti, Pongal, Lohri and more: Significance of these festivals, celebrated across India<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Makar Sankranti marks the Sun changing directions and shifting its trajectory towards the north, therefore, entering the Makara or Capricorn zodiac sign.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":19363,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-19362","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19362"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19362\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}