What is "hindu calendar"

Hindoo calendar \Hin"doo calendar\ or Hindu calendar \Hindu calendar\ . A lunisolar calendar of India, according to which the year is divided into twelve months, with an extra month inserted after every month in which two new moons occur (once in three years).

Note: The intercalary month has the name of the one which precedes it. The year usually commences about April 11. The months are follows: Baisakh . . . . . . . . . . April-May Jeth . . . . . . . . . . . . . May-June Asarh . . . . . . . . . . . . June-July Sawan (Sarawan) . . . . . . . July-Aug. Bhadon . . . . . . . . . . . Aug.-Sept. Asin (Kuar). . . . . . . . . . Sept.-Oct. Katik (Kartik) . . . . . . . . Oct.-Nov. Aghan . . . . . . . . . . . . Nov.-Dec. Pus . . . . . . . . . . . . . Dec.-Jan. Magh . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jan.-Feb. Phagun (Phalgun) . . . . . . . Feb.-March Chait . . . . . . . . . . . . March-April

Hindu calendar is a collective name for most of the luni-sidereal calendars and sidereal calendars traditionally used in Hinduism.

The Hindu calendars have undergone many changes in the process of regionalisation. Some of the more prominent national and regional Hindu calendars include the official Nepali calendar in the himalayan country Nepal and in India Punjabi calendar, Bengali calendar, Odia calendar, Malayalam calendar, Kannada panchanga, Tulu calendar, Tamil calendar, Vikrama Samvat and Shalivahana calendar in the Deccan states of Karnataka, Telangana, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh.

The common feature of many regional Hindu calendars is that the names of the twelve months are the same (because the names are based in Sanskrit). The month which starts the year also varies from region to region.

The Buddhist calendar and the traditional lunisolar calendars of Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Thailand are also based on an older version of the Hindu calendar.

Most of the Hindu calendars derived from Gupta era astronomy as developed by Āryabhaṭa and Varāhamihira in the 5th to 6th century. These in turn were based in the astronomical tradition of Vedāṅga Jyotiṣa, which in the preceding centuries had been standardised in a number of (non-extant) works known as Sūrya Siddhānta. Regional diversification took place in the medieval period. The astronomical foundations were further developed in the medieval period, notably by Bhāskara II (12th century).

Differences and regional variations abound in these computations, but the following is a general overview of the Hindu lunisolar calendar.

The Indian national calendar or "Saka calendar" was introduced in 1957 based on the traditional Hindu calendars.