Ravivar (Sunday) Vrat सूर्य देव
The Sunday fast for Surya Dev — for health, eyesight, vitality and honour.
Vrat mantra
ॐ घृणि सूर्याय नमः
Om Ghrini Suryaya Namah
What you can eat — and what to avoid
✓ You can have
- Single meal before sunset: wheat-gud (jaggery) items, halwa, kheer — sweet, salt-free food
- Fruits and fresh fruit juices
- Milk, curd, paneer, butter, ghee
- Sabudana — khichdi, kheer or vada
- Kuttu (buckwheat) and singhara flour rotis / puris
- Samak (barnyard millet) rice
- Makhana, dry fruits and nuts
- Potato, sweet potato, arbi — cooked with sendha namak
- Sendha namak (rock salt) only
- Tea, coffee or coconut water in moderation
✗ Avoid
- Salt — the Ravivar vrat is traditionally completely salt-free
- Oil-fried and tamasik food
- All grains — wheat, rice, semolina (sooji), besan, oats
- Pulses and legumes — dal, chana, rajma, soy
- Regular table / sea salt (use only sendha namak)
- Onion and garlic
- Non-vegetarian food and eggs
- Alcohol and tobacco
- Heavy spices — keep to jeera, kali mirch, green chilli
Step-by-step vrat vidhi
Sankalpa — the vrat morning
Wake early, bathe and wear clean clothes. With water, akshat and a flower in the right palm, state your name, the vrat (Ravivar (Sunday) Vrat), its count if it is a series, and your prayer — then release the water.
Morning puja
Bathe before sunrise and offer arghya to the rising sun from a copper lota — water with roli, akshat and red flowers — chanting "Om Ghrini Suryaya Namah"; apply a red-sandalwood tilak.
Keep the fast through the day
Keep the fast as prescribed — one meal before sunset · traditionally no salt all day. Spend free moments in japa of "Om Ghrini Suryaya Namah", and keep the mind sattvik: no anger, gossip or harsh speech.
Katha & evening puja
Before the meal, read the Ravivar vrat katha and remember Surya Dev with the aarti; take the meal before the sun sets.
Paran — breaking the fast
Take the single meal before sunset. If the sun has already set, traditionally the fast continues until the next sunrise arghya.
Daan & prasad
Share the prasad with everyone present and give some daan (food, fruit or dakshina) as per capacity — the vrat is completed by giving.
Special rules for this vrat
- The morning arghya to the rising sun is the heart of this vrat — face east, pour slowly, eyes on the stream.
- Wear red or saffron; offer red flowers and red chandan.
- Sunday vrat food is taken once, before sunset, without salt.
Family and regional traditions (parampara) vary — where yours differs, follow your parampara. Children, the elderly, pregnant women, and anyone unwell or on medication should keep a softened vrat (fruit and milk) or skip it — a vrat is bhakti and restraint, never hardship to the body.
Choose another vrat
What is a Vrat Vidhi?
A vrat vidhi is the procedure for keeping a sacred fast — from the morning sankalpa (vow), the deity's puja, the discipline of the fast through the day, the katha (vrat story) and aarti, to the paran (breaking of the fast) at its proper time. Each vrat has its own food rules: most allow phalahar (fruits, milk, sabudana, kuttu and singhara flour, samak rice, with sendha namak only), some are kept nirjala (without even water, like Karwa Chauth), and a few carry one defining rule — no grains on Ekadashi, nothing sour on the Santoshi Mata vrat, no salt on the Ravivar vrat.
Pick a Dev or Devi to see the complete vidhi of their vrat — the day, the fast type, what you can eat and what to avoid, the paran rule, mantra, katha and aarti — and use the linked samagri checklist where one exists. A vrat is bhakti and self-restraint, never hardship: children, the elderly, pregnant women and the unwell should keep a softened form, and family traditions (parampara) always come first.