Bhadrapada Shukla Chaturdashi — the Anant vrat's fourteen-knot thread for Vishnu, and Ganesh Visarjan, the tearful grand finale of Ganeshotsav. Exact Anant Chaturdashi dates for Ottawa, computed for your timezone.
When: Bhadrapada Shukla Chaturdashi — the tenth day of Ganeshotsav; exact Ottawa dates below
The vrat: Ananta (endless) Vishnu worshipped with a fourteen-knot silk thread tied on the arm
The scripture: Krishna teaches the vrat to Yudhishthira in exile — fourteen years of it restored the Pandavas
The visarjan: Ganesha's murtis, home and public, are carried in procession and immersed in water
The cry: "Ganpati Bappa Morya, pudhchya varshi laukar ya" — come again early next year
The Endless Knotted Fourteen Times
Anant Chaturdashi carries two festivals in one tithi. The older is the Anant vrat: Vishnu worshipped as Ananta, the Endless One resting on the serpent Shesha, through a red-and-silk thread of fourteen knots — one for each of the fourteen worlds the Endless holds. The Mahabharata frames it tenderly: Krishna teaches the vrat to Yudhishthira at the Pandavas' lowest ebb, promising that fourteen years of the anant sutra would restore what was lost — and it did. Families who keep the vrat tie the thread (men on the right arm, women on the left) after a puja whose katha remembers Sushila and Kaundinya, and the lesson inside it: prosperity forgotten as one's own achievement unravels; tied back to the Endless, it holds.
Ganpati Goes Home
The same day is Ganeshotsav's thunderous, tear-streaked finale. The murti welcomed ten days earlier as a guest of honour is worshipped one last time — the uttar puja — then carried out with drums, lezim dancers and gulal to the water, because clay must return to the element it came from: creation dissolving so it can be created again, the festival's whole theology in one immersion. Mumbai's processions to Girgaum Chowpatty run past midnight with millions in the streets; the cry everywhere is the same — 'Ganpati Bappa Morya, pudhchya varshi laukar ya': beloved Ganpati, come again soon next year. Households keeping shorter Ganeshotsavs of one and a half, five or seven days have already done their visarjan; Anant Chaturdashi gathers everyone else. Exact Ottawa dates are in the Festivals & Dates list on this page.
Anant Chaturdashi in Ottawa & Canada
Canadian Ganeshotsav ends the same way, scaled to bylaws and September water temperatures: mandirs and Maharashtrian mandals in Ottawa, Toronto and Montreal organize collective visarjans — often at a designated river or lake point with city permission, increasingly with eco-murtis of unbaked clay that dissolve harmlessly, and many families now immerse a small clay Ganesha at home in a bucket or tub and pour the water to a garden, which tradition fully accepts. The anant sutra side of the day travels even more easily: the thread, the katha and the simple kheer offering ask nothing of geography. Check your local temple for the collective visarjan's timing — and our computed Ottawa dates for the tithi are below.
Each link opens our computed festival calendar with exact dates and timings for your city.
Questions
When is Anant Chaturdashi this year in Ottawa?
It falls on Bhadrapada Shukla Chaturdashi, the tenth day after Ganesh Chaturthi — the exact Ottawa date is in the Festivals & Dates list on this page, computed for the Canadian timezone.
What do the fourteen knots of the anant sutra mean?
One knot for each of the fourteen worlds upheld by Vishnu as Ananta, the Endless. The thread is tied on the arm after the puja — right arm for men, left for women — and kept on for the year's protection.
How can Ganesh Visarjan be done in Canada?
Join a mandir or mandal's organized visarjan at a permitted waterfront, or immerse an unbaked-clay eco-murti at home in a tub and return the water to a garden — the tradition asks that clay go back to water, and both keep that promise.
Source: Mahabharata (Anant vrat told to Yudhishthira); Ganeshotsav tradition. Regional versions may vary — this text follows the version most widely used in community worship.