Basant marks the coming of spring, when the mustard flowers turn the fields yellow. Punjabis wore yellow, ate yellow sweets and flew kites, and Lahore became famous for the kite festival in which the whole city took to its rooftops to fight kite battles in the sky.
Maharaja Ranjit Singh held great Basant durbars, with his troops in yellow, and the festival was celebrated at the shrine of Madho Lal Hussain. Sufi shrines in Lahore and Kasur held their own Basant gatherings.
In Pakistan the festival was banned in 2007 after deaths caused by glass-coated and metal kite strings. In East Punjab Basant is still celebrated, especially at Patiala and in the villages, with kites and yellow clothes.
More festivals and fairs
The harvest festival and the birthday of the Khalsa, when Guru Gobind Singh called for five heads in 1699.
The midwinter bonfire, for the longest night, the new bride and the newborn son, and for Dulla Bhatti.
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Guru Gobind Singh's festival of mock battles, horsemanship and poetry at Anandpur.
The day Guru Hargobind came home from Gwalior, freeing 52 princes, and Amritsar was lit with lamps.
The women's festival of the monsoon: swings in the trees, giddha, and daughters coming home.
The day after Lohri, when Sikhs remember the Forty Liberated at Muktsar.
The festival of lamps at the shrine of Shah Hussain in Lahore, once the greatest fair of the Punjab.
Three days of prayer, qawwali and free food at the shrine of Lahore's patron saint.
The ten days of mourning for Imam Hussain, with processions of taziyas and banners through the old cities of the Punjab.
The great Hindu festivals as the Punjab keeps them: Ravana's effigies burning at Dussehra, lamps at Diwali, colour at Holi.
The great fair in honour of Gugga Pir, lord of snakes, in a village of Ludhiana district each September.
A fair of lamps at the shrine of a Sufi pir in Jagraon, still kept by Punjabis of every faith on the Indian side.
The goddess girls make on the wall each autumn, from clay stars and a painted face, and sing to for nine nights.
The autumn day when married women fast from dawn until the moon rises, for their husbands' long lives.
Three days of mourning and remembrance at Fatehgarh Sahib for the youngest sons of Guru Gobind Singh, bricked up alive at Sirhind in 1704.
The oldest festival of classical music in India, held every winter beside the Devi Talab temple in Jalandhar.
The festival of lights, processions and langar for Guru Nanak's birth, when pilgrims from India cross to Nankana Sahib.
Eid prayers at the Badshahi Mosque, sweet vermicelli, new clothes and Eidi for the children.
The day sisters tie a thread on their brothers' wrists, and brothers promise to protect them.
The night the 'Gate of Paradise' at Baba Farid's shrine is opened and pilgrims crowd through it.
Pilgrims of every faith walking with drums and banners to the shrine of Lakhdata Pir at the foot of the Suleiman hills.
Ladies playing Chess, Arki School of Art, attributed to Basant Singh, circa 1930 CEBhuri Singh Museum, Chamba · photo SpeakingArch (Wikimedia Commons) · CC BY-SA ↗