Wikipedia
The Songkran festival (, , listen) the Thai New Year's festival. The Thai New Year's Day is 13 April every year, but the holiday period includes 14–15 April as well. The word "Songkran" comes from the Sanskrit word ( Devanāgarī: संक्रांति), literally "astrological passage", meaning transformation or change. The term was borrowed from Makar Sankranti, the name of a Hindu harvest festival celebrated in India in January to mark the arrival of spring. It coincides with the rising of Aries on the astrological chart, the New Year of many calendars of South and Southeast Asia. The festive occasion is in keeping with the Buddhist/ Hindu solar calendar.
Lao New Year, called Songkran (, ) or Pii Mai (, ), is celebrated every year from April 13/14 to April 15/16.
Songkran is a term derived from the Sanskrit word, (or, more specifically, ). It refers to the traditional New Year celebrated in Thailand, Laos and several other Southeast Asian and South Asian countries when the sun transits the constellation of Aries, the first astrological sign in the Zodiac, as reckoned by sidereal astrology:
- Cambodian New Year
- Songkran (Lao), in Laos
- Sinhalese New Year, in Sri Lanka
- Songkran (Thailand)
- Thingyan, in Myanmar
- Nepali New Year
- Vaisakhi, in Punjab, India
- Pohela Boishakh, West Bengal, India and Bangladesh
- Vishu, in Kerala, India
- Kashmiri New Year, in Jammu and Kashmir, India
- Pana Sankranti, in Odisha, India
- Meitei Cheiraoba, in Manipur, India
- Ugadi, in Telangana, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, India
- Puthandu, in Tamil Nadu, India
- Bihu, in Assam, India
- Dai New Year, celebrated by the Dai people of Yunnan, China and the Tai Dam people of northern Vietnam.
Easter weekend occasionally coincides with Songkran (in Thailand, most recently in 1979, 1990, and 2001, but not again until 2085).