Raksha Bandhan, also Rakshabandhan,is a popular, traditionally Hindu, annual rite, or ceremony, which is central to a festival of the same name celebrated in South Asia, and in other parts of the world significantly influenced by Hindu culture. On this day, sisters of all ages tie a red thread called the rakhi, around the wrists of their brothers, symbolically protecting them, receiving a gift in return, and traditionally investing the brothers with a share of the responsibility of their potential care.
Raksha Bandhan is observed on the last day of the Hindu lunar calendar month of Shraavana, which typically falls in August. The expression "Raksha Bandhan," Sanskrit, literally, "the bond of protection, obligation, or care," is now principally applied to this ritual. Until the mid-20th-century, the expression was more commonly applied to a similar ritual, also held on the same day, with precedence in ancient Hindu texts, in which a domestic priest ties amulets, charms, or threads on the wrists of his patrons, or changes their sacred thread, and receives gifts of money; in some places, this is still the case.In contrast, the sister-brother festival, with origins in folk culture, had names which varied with location, with some rendered as Saluno,Silono,and Rakri.A ritual associated with Saluno included the sisters placing shoots of barley behind the ears of their brothers.
Example of Rakhi Covers issued by India Post.