Completion of 16-day Mahalakshmi Vrat; final puja and feast

Mahalakshmi Vrat is a sixteen-day observance that begins on Bhadrapada Shukla Ashtami (Radha Ashtami) and concludes on Ashwin Krishna Ashtami, the day on which the vrat is completed with a grand puja and udyapan. Devotees worship Goddess Mahalakshmi, often in her Gaja Lakshmi form flanked by elephants, for wealth, prosperity and the well-being of the family. On the first day a sacred thread of sixteen strands with sixteen knots is tied on the right wrist, and on the final day it is untied and offered to the Goddess. The number sixteen runs through the whole vrat — sixteen days, sixteen knots, sixteen offerings and sixteen durva blades. The Bhavishya Purana relates that Krishna told Yudhishthira of this vrat, and a popular katha tells how Kunti, by worshipping a live elephant brought down from Indra's heaven by Arjuna, received greater blessing than Gandhari with her clay elephant. On the concluding night women offer arghya to the rising Moon, and a clay elephant is worshipped in many homes of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Maharashtra.

Many devotees fast on the first and last days only; some fast all sixteen days. The fast is broken after Chandra arghya.