Bikram Sambat

Bikram Sambat or Vikram Samvat abbreberated as BS is a hindu calendar system started by King Bikramaditya in India. Bikram Sambat calendar is used as official calendar in Nepal and some parts of India. Bikram sambat calendar is a lunisideral calendar because it uses lunar months and sidereal years for timekeeping. The Bikram Sambat calendar is 56.7 years ahead of the solar Gregorian calendar. The Bikram Sambat calendar have following months: Baisakh, Jestha, Ashad, Shrawan, Bhadra, Ashoj, Kartik, Mangsir, Poush, Magh, Falgun and Chaitra. The new year begins with Baisakh month i.e. mid April according to gregorian calendar. Bikram sambat calendar ends with Chaitra month.

How Bikram Sambat started?

The story of how Bikram Sambat started is told by a monk Mahesara Suri. Gardabhilla, the powerful king of Ujjain, kidnapped a nun. Nun was the sister of the monk. The monk went to the Saka King to get help. Saka King beat Gardabhilla and captured him and made king of Ujjain a prisoner. Later, Gardabhilla was forgiven and run away to a forest, where he was killed by a tiger. In the end, Vikramaditya invaded Ujjain and drove away the Sakas. To commemorate this event he started a new era called the Vikrama era or Bikram era.

Along with Nepal, Northern India Bagladesh also use some elements of Bikram Sambat calendar. The calendar months of Bengali calendar are similar to Bikram sambat calendar and New year starts exactly at a same time.

Conversion between Bikram Sambat dates and Gregorian Dates is not simple. It cannot be done by a formula and needs database mappings. However for rough calculation following formula can be used:

Nepali Date to English Date: Subtract 56 Years, 8 Months, 17 Days
English Date to Nepali Date: Add 56 Years, 8 Months, 7 Days

For the most accurate Nepali Date Converter visit Nepali Date Converter

Important Links