"Initially, we used to worship Sugda or clay pots, sugarcanes and other plants from the field. Now we just perform prayers and celebrate it with all our friends and relatives", says Bharati Shinde from Shivajinagar. The festival actually begins with Bhogi that comes just a day before Sankranti. Mixed curry and rice are prepared on this occasion. Since the it’s a cold season, til is the ingredient used to create heat. This festival means a lot to the newly married couple and newborn babies who are adorned with ornaments made of til gud. This is also a special day for married women in Maharashtra who are invited for a get-together called 'Haldi-Kumkum' and given gifts of any utensil, which the woman of the house purchases on that day.

Shashikala Ghorpade elaborates over the significance of the festivities. She says that Makar Sankranti marks the transition of the Sun from Sagittarius to Capricorn, during the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere. From this day begins the six-month long Uttarayana considered very auspicious for Hindus. "While exchanging til guds as tokens of goodwill people greet each other. The under-lying thought in the exchange of til guds is to forget the past ill-feelings and hostilities and resolve to speak sweetly and remain friends," adds Ghorpade.

Vijaymala Sawant from Kothrud says, "We get up early in the morning, before sunrise, have bath and be ready with water and flowers for the sunrise. Then we have a special session of meditation. Also it has been a long tradition in my family to give some daan to the Savashnis ( unmarried daughters)," she says.

Lohri just comes along with Makar Sankranti and on this day sacrifices are made to the fire God. The central character of most Lohri songs is Dulla Bhatti, a Muslim highway robber who lived in Punjab during the reign of Emperor Akbar. Besides robbing the rich, he rescued Hindu girls being forcibly taken to be sold in the slave market of the Middle East. He arranged their marriages to Hindu boys with Hindu rituals and provided them with dowry. Understandably, though a bandit, he became a hero of all Punjabis. So every other Lohri song has words to express gratitude to Dulla Bhatti.

"Everybody in the group contributes money and then we get the wood. We gather in a clubhouse and light the woods where we offer rewadi and popcorns to the fire God. Then we all dine together," says Anant Kochar from MG Road. "We celebrate Lohri with great enthusiasm," says T R Soni, a member of the Punjabi Cultural Association.