Mangani Thiruvizha

Karaikal's own festival, with no equivalent in Puducherry town. It belongs to the Shaivite saint tradition of the Kaveri delta rather than to Puducherry's French coast.

It commemorates Karaikal Ammaiyar, born Punithavathi, one of the sixty-three Nayanmar saints of Tamil Shaivism and one of very few women among them, and the mango of her legend.

Curd rice and mangoes — the exact foods of the legend — are distributed in a hall beside the temple. The five deities are processed street by street, and on the main day mangoes are thrown down into the crowd from the rooftops around the temple.

Mangoes and curd rice are distributed; the Panchamurthi are processed through the streets; mangoes are thrown from the rooftops on the main day.

Childless couples try specifically to catch one of the mangoes thrown from the rooftops — the fruit itself is the blessing.

The festival grew around the cult of Karaikal Ammaiyar, whose legend turns on a mango given, eaten and miraculously restored.