There are three national holidays: Republic Day (26 January), Independence Day (15 August), and Gandhi Jayanti (2 October) which occur on the same day every year. In addition, there are four major nationwide festivals with shifting dates to be aware of:

Holi, in February or March — The festival of color is a major festival celebrated mainly in North, East and Western India. On the first day, people go to temples and light bonfires, but on the second, it’s a watertight combined with showers of colored powder. This is not a spectator sport: as a visible foreigner, you’re a magnet for attention, so you’ll either have to barricade yourself inside, or put on your most disposable clothes and join the fray. Alcohol and bhang (cannabis) are often involved and crowds can get rowdy as the evening wears on. Celebrations are fewer in South India, though private celebrations occur among North Indian communities residing in major South Indian cities

Durga Puja / Navarathri/Dussehara, Sep-Oct — A nine-day festival culminating in the holy day of Dasara, when locals worship the deity Durga. Workers are given sweets, cash bonuses, gifts and new clothes. It is also new year for businessmen, when they are supposed to start new account books. In some places like West Bengal, Durga Puja is the most important festival. In the north Dussehara celebrations take place and the slaying of Ravana by Lord Rama is ceremonially reenacted as Ram Lila. In Gujarat and South India, it is celebrated as Navarathri where the festival is celebrated by dancing to devotional songs and religious observances like fasts extended over a period of 9 nights.

Eid-ul-Fitr, the largest religious holiday of the year for Indian Muslims, it celebrates the start of the holy month of Shawwal. Ramzan ends with the Eid-ul-Fitr festival extending over several days. Food is the highlight, and if you’re lucky you’ll be invited into a private home for a feast. Businesses close for at least a couple days if not a week.

Diwali (Deepavali), Oct-Nov — The festival of lights, celebrates the return of Lord Rama to the capital of his kingdom, Ayodhya after an exile of 14 years. Probably the most lavish festival in the country, reminiscent (to U.S. travellers at least) of the food of Thanksgiving and the shopping and gifts of Christmas combined. Houses are decorated, there is glitter everywhere, and if you wander the streets on Diwali night, there will be firecrackers going off everywhere including sometimes under your feet.

Apart from these, each state has its own major national festival like Onam for Kerala or Sankranti for Andhra Pradesh & Karnataka or Pongal for Tamil Nadu or Baisakhi for Punjab or “Ratha Yatra” for Odisha, which is celebrated as public holiday in respective states.

Religious holidays occur on different days each year, because the Hindu and Islamic festivals are based on their respective calendars and not on the Gregorian calendar. Most of them are celebrated only locally, so check the state or city you are visiting for information on whether there will be closures. Different regions might give somewhat different names to the same festival. To cater to varying religious practices, offices have a list of optional holidays (called restricted holidays by the government) from which employees are allowed to pick two, in addition to the list of fixed holidays. This may mean thin attendance and delayed service even when the office is officially open.

Major cities are Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Agra for more read 

Regions – cites of India

Talk

India is home to thousands of languages. The main language families in India are Indo-European and Dravidian (which are about 800 million speakers and 200 million speakers respectively). Other language families include Austro-Asiatic and Tibeto-Burman, among other minor ones. Hindi is recognized as the main official language of the Union Government (there is no recognized National Language of India), with English acting as a “subsidiary” official language.