Navaratri, "nine nights", is a major Hindu festival devoted to the Divine Mother, the goddess in her many forms, culminating on a tenth day of victory. Several Navaratris fall through the year, but the most widely kept is the autumn Sharada Navaratri in the month of Ashvin (September-October). Its central narrative is the Goddess's battle with and destruction of the buffalo demon Mahishasura, told in the Devi Mahatmya, a text that presents her not as a consort but as the supreme power (shakti) who accomplishes what the male gods cannot; the festival is thus, in its theology, an assertion of the feminine as the ultimate divine energy.
A common scheme divides the nine nights among three great goddesses in turn, Durga the warrior, Lakshmi of abundance, and Saraswati of learning, each worshipped for three nights, so that the whole festival moves from the conquest of evil through prosperity to wisdom. Devotees fast, keep vigils, and worship successive aspects of the Goddess, and in many homes an image or pot (ghata) is installed for the duration. The festival's tenth day, Vijayadashami or Dussehra, marks the final victory and is treated in its own entry.