Hola Mohalla is held at Anandpur Sahib on the day after Holi. Guru Gobind Singh Ji instituted it as a military exercise: mock battles, weapons practice, and a march, in place of the colour throwing.
The Nihang dals hold it. The Budha Dal and Taruna Dal camp at Anandpur and the closing procession is a march of horsemen in blue with spears through the town and across the Charan Ganga.
The events include gatka, tent pegging, standing on two galloping horses, and displays of edged weapons that would not be permitted anywhere else in India.
It draws lakhs of people over three days; the Punjab government expected about 40 lakh in 2023.
It is also one of the very few institutions in South Asia in which a three-hundred-year-old military order still performs its own function annually in public, on the ground where it was formed.
The Nihangs ride in from their deras across Punjab and camp for the days of the festival. The mohalla itself is a column that moves through the town in the form of a mock army.
The langars during Hola are run by villages, by deras and by families, and a person can walk the length of Anandpur eating and never pay for anything.
It was instituted as a martial exercise in place of the colour throwing of Holi. The name is the masculine form built from Holi, and that grammatical turn is the point of it.