The Tamil Nadu state government on Tuesday, 22 October, announced a total of 23 public holidays for the year 2020. This number is the exact same as last year. The holidays, that come under Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881, are applicable for government offices and commercial banks, including cooperative banks.
Of the 23 days, seven are on weekends days. January and August are the months with most number of holidays – five each. The months of February, June, July and September have no public holidays.
The Pongal holiday clubbed with the weekend holidays will amount to five consecutive days of holidays this year. The Puja holidays fall on Sunday and Monday in 2020 and Deepavali is on a Saturday.
Christmas, that falls on a Friday, will amount to three consecutive days of holidays including the weekend. Same goes for Good Friday, May Day, Gandhi Jayanti and Milad-un-Nabi that are on Fridays. Republic Day and Independence Day are on Sunday and Saturday respectively.
The first quarter holidays include New Year's Day (Wednesday, 1 January), Pongal (Wednesday, 15 January), Tiruvalluvar Day (Thursday, 16 January), Uzhavar Thirunal (Friday, 17 January), Republic Day (Sunday, 26 January) and Telugu New Year's Day (Wednesday, 23 March).
In the second quarter, annual closing of accounts for commercial banks and co-operative banks (1 April), Mahaveer Jayanti (Monday, 6 April), Good Friday (Friday, 10 April), Tamil New Year's Day and BR Ambedkar's Birthday (Tuesday, 14 April), May Day (Friday, 1 May) and Ramzan (Monday, 25 May) are the public holidays.
The third quarter holidays include Bakrid (Saturday, 1 August), Krishna Jayanti (Tuesday, 11 August), Independence Day (Saturday, 15 August), Vinayakar Chathurthi (Saturday, 22 August) and Muharram (Sunday, 30 August).
As for the last quarter, holidays include Gandhi Jayanti (Friday, 2 October), Ayutha Puja (Sunday, 25 October), Vijaya Dasami (Monday, 26 October), Milad-un-Nabi (Friday, 30 October), Deepavali (Saturday, 14 November) and Christmas (Friday, 25 December).
(This story was first published in The News Minute and has been republished with permission.)
(At The Quint, we are answerable only to our audience. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member. Because the truth is worth it.)