Why we throw colour at Holi

Reading time aloud: about four minutes.

There is a bonfire the night before Holi, and most people who dance around it haven't been told why. This is why.

The boy who would not stop

There was a king called Hiranyakashipu who had won a boon: he could not be killed by man or beast, by day or by night, indoors or outdoors, on the ground or in the air, by any weapon. Being effectively unkillable, he decided he should be worshipped as a god, and made it law.

His own son Prahlad would not do it. The boy worshipped Vishnu, quietly and without arguing, and would not stop — not when he was threatened, not when he was thrown from a cliff, not when he was trampled or poisoned. Each time he was unharmed, and each time he went back to praying.

The king's sister was Holika, and she had a shawl that could not burn. She offered to sit in a great fire holding the boy on her lap.

They built the fire and she carried him in.

And the shawl lifted off her in the heat and wrapped itself around Prahlad, and she burned, and he walked out.

His father died soon after — at dusk, which is neither day nor night, on a threshold, which is neither inside nor out, on the lap of Vishnu in the form of Narasimha, a being neither man nor beast, torn by claws, which are not weapons. Every clause of the boon kept, and every one useless.

And the colour?

That's a different story, and a gentler one. Krishna, blue-skinned, complained to his mother that Radha was fair and he was not, and she told him — half joking — to go and colour Radha's face whatever shade he liked. He did, with a great deal of enthusiasm, and everyone else joined in, and they have not stopped since.

So Holi is two things on two days: Holika Dahan, the bonfire, on the night before — and Rangwali Holi, the colour, the next morning.

Last updated: 2026-08-11