Karva Chauth (Hindi: करवा चौथ) is a one-day festival celebrated by Hindu women in North India in which married women fast from sunrise to moonrise for the safety and longevity of their husbands. The fast is traditionally observed in the states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, parts of Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, and Punjab. The festival falls on the fourth day after the full moon, in the Hindu lunisolar calendar month of Kartik. Sometimes, unmarried women observe the fast for their fiancés or desired husbands.
A similar festival known as Chhath is observed in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand and western Bihar. In Sindh, Teej is celebrated in the same style.
Karva is another word for 'pot' (a small earthen pot of water) and chauth means 'fourth' in Hindi (a reference to the fact that the festival falls on the fourth day of the dark-fortnight, or krishna paksh, of the month of Kartik).
The festival originated and came to be celebrated only in the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent. The hypothesis is that military campaigns were often conducted by Hindus who were defending India against Mughal invaders, they would often leave their wives and children to go off to war. Their wives would often pray and observe a day of socialising, with other women, by preparing special meals, and dressing up in their finest regalia, and having what would today be deemed as a romantic evening with their husband before he went off to war.