AA Gifts
₹100/pc
A lotus-shaped brass diya in coloured enamel that a guest will fill with oil and light on her own doorstep the same Karthigai evening.
Karthigai Deepam 2026 · 24 November
Karthigai Deepam Return Gifts, Made for Lamp-Lighting Evenings
Brass diyas, kumkum chimizh, pooja trays and thamboolam bags for Karthigai Deepam — from our Medavakkam studio to homes, temples, apartment associations and offices across Tamil Nadu, South India and beyond. Minimum 50 pieces per design, mixed orders on request.
What Makes a Good Karthigai Deepam Return Gift?
The best Karthigai Deepam return gifts are lamp-and-pooja items the family will actually use again: brass agal vilakku (the small clay-shaped oil lamps lit at the doorstep) and enamel lotus diyas, kumkum chimizh (small kumkum boxes), pooja trays, and thamboolam bags holding vetrilai paakku (betel leaf and areca nut) with manjal-kumkumam (turmeric and kumkum). Prices start from about ₹12 for a small haldi-kumkum bottle holder and go up to about ₹350 for a German silver pooja plate, with most Karthigai orders landing between about ₹50 and ₹180 a piece. Our minimum order is 50 pieces per design, and mixed orders are supported on request. Karthigai Deepam 2026 falls on 24 November 2026, and because it is the festival of lamps — rows of agal vilakku on every doorstep and verandah in Tamil Nadu, with the Maha Deepam lit on the Thiruvannamalai hill the same evening — a gift shaped like a lamp, or meant to hold the things of the pooja room, feels right in a way a generic favour never does. That is the whole rule for this festival: give light, or give something that serves the light. A brass diya handed to a neighbour on Karthigai evening gets lit again next Deepavali, next Varalakshmi Vratham, next Friday. A plastic trinket goes into a drawer. We build every Karthigai range at AA Gifts around that one idea, in metal and brass and copper, at wholesale rates that work for a 50-piece apartment block order or a 500-piece temple committee distribution.
Karthigai Deepam Gift Budgets at a Glance
Pick your per-piece budget first, then the design. Every tier below works for Karthigai Deepam — the difference is weight, metal and finish, not usefulness. All prices are per piece, minimum 50 pieces per design.
Street and apartment distribution
Under ₹50 Favors
For the big-count evenings — a whole apartment block, a street, a temple queue. Small steel plates, bangle-style kumkum favours and haldi-kumkum glass bottle holders from about ₹12 to ₹45 each. Light to carry, easy to hand over at the gate, and still a real metal or glass item rather than a throwaway.
Browse Under ₹50 Favors →
The most-ordered Karthigai range
₹50 to ₹100 Favors
This is where most Karthigai Deepam orders sit. Kolam-printed jute thamboolam bags at about ₹50, Murugan canvas bags at about ₹65, silk brocade mini baskets at about ₹20 for kumkum cups, and enamel brass lotus diyas and five-diya trays at about ₹100. Looks like a proper gift, prices like a bulk favour.
Browse ₹50–₹100 Favors →
Close family and sumangali guests
₹100 to ₹200 Favors
For the sumangali (married women) you invite personally, close relatives and long-standing customers. Brass lotus and parrot print trays at about ₹160, round lotus trays at about ₹150, floral Pichwai trays at about ₹180, copper bowls at about ₹180 and hammered copper storage jars at about ₹135. Heavier metal, visible finish.
Browse ₹100–₹200 Favors →
Head of family, trustees, corporate
Above ₹200 Favors
Deluxe Karthigai pooja gifts for elders, temple trustees, office seniors and client hampers. Engraved brass pooja plates at about ₹250, German silver pooja plates at about ₹350, maroon-gold brass kolam sets and kolam dabara sets at about ₹350, and floral etched German silver trays at about ₹350. Gift-box worthy without extra packing.
Browse Deluxe Pooja Favors →
Lamps & Diyas
1. Brass Diyas and Lamp-Shaped Gifts for Karthigai Deepam
Karthigai Deepam is a deepam (lamp) festival before it is anything else. Families wash the doorstep, draw a kolam, and set out rows of agal vilakku filled with sesame oil at dusk, while the kuthuvilakku (the tall standing lamp) burns in the pooja room. A return gift that is itself a lamp, or that carries lamps, is the single safest choice you can make for this evening. Everything in this group is metal, reusable, and will be lit again at Deepavali, Varalakshmi Vratham and ordinary Friday poojas for years. Wholesale buyers usually start here and then add a small kumkum item from the next section to complete the set.
₹100/pc
Five joined diyas on one peacock tray, so a family can light a full row of lamps at the entrance without juggling separate vilakku.
₹250/pc
A deep engraved brass plate that becomes the household aarti plate, holding the lit camphor, kumkum and flowers during the deepam pooja.
₹100/pc
A small meenakari peacock bowl that sits beside the kuthuvilakku to hold akshathai, flower petals or the day's prasadham.
Kumkum & Chimizh
2. Kumkum Chimizh and Manjal-Kumkumam Keepsakes
No Tamil festival ends without manjal-kumkumam — the turmeric and kumkum given to every sumangali who steps into the house. On Karthigai Deepam neighbours walk in and out all evening to see the lamps, so the hostess needs a steady stock of small, beautiful containers she can hand over in seconds. A kumkum chimizh (the little lidded kumkum box) is the classic answer: it costs little, weighs almost nothing in a courier box, and lands straight on the guest's own pooja shelf. These also work beautifully as the second item inside a thamboolam bag.
₹100/pc
A plain, sturdy brass kumkum box the guest will keep filled on her pooja shelf and open every single morning.
₹120/pc
A square antique-finish box with an embossed peacock lid, heavy enough to feel like a keepsake rather than a giveaway.
₹100/pc
Hand-painted enamel kumkum boxes in festival colours that guests will line up beside the vilakku and use for manjal-kumkumam all year.
₹12/pc
A lotus-stand holder for two small glass bottles, perfect when you are giving manjal and kumkum separately to a long queue of visitors.
Thamboolam
3. Thamboolam Bags and Ready Vetrilai Paakku Sets
Thamboolam is the bundle a Tamil family sends home with every guest — vetrilai paakku (betel leaf and areca nut), a coconut, fruit, manjal-kumkumam and a small gift. On Karthigai Deepam the thamboolam usually travels back across the street at night, so the bag matters: it has to hold weight, look festive by lamplight, and survive the walk home. Jute and canvas bags in kolam prints do this cheaply and look far costlier than they are. Buy the bag and the kumkum item together and you have a complete thamboolam under ₹100 a head.
₹50/pc
A kolam-printed jute bag set sized for the full thamboolam, so the guest carries coconut, fruit and betel leaves home in one hand.
₹40/pc
A simple heritage-print bag that families reuse for temple visits and the next function instead of throwing it away.
₹15/pc
A cutout stand with manjal and kumkum glass bottles already set in it, ready to drop into the thamboolam bag with no extra assembly.
Deluxe Keepsakes
4. Deluxe Pooja Trays and Pichwai Keepsakes
Every Karthigai list needs a top tier — for the elders who light the first lamp, for temple trustees and committee members, for the office seniors and the customers you want to keep. These pieces are heavier, in German silver, copper or hand-printed Pichwai art, and they are designed to be handed over on their own without wrapping. Most buyers order 50 of a mid-range design for the crowd and 10 to 20 of something from this group for the short list. That mix is allowed under our mixed-order policy on request.
₹180/pc
A Pichwai floral tray that goes straight onto the guest's pooja shelf or centre table and keeps earning compliments long after the festival.
₹350/pc
A broad German silver plate an elder will use as the main aarti thatta for every festival and family function at home.
₹135/pc
A hammered copper jar with a lotus lid that families fill with prasadham, dry fruits or akshathai and keep in the pooja room.
📐 Practical Planning Tip
How Many Karthigai Deepam Gifts Should You Order?
Formula: Expected Visitors × 1.20 = Safe Order Count
Karthigai Deepam is not a seated function, so you cannot plan it like a wedding. The lamps go out at dusk and neighbours, relatives and children keep walking in through the evening to see the agal vilakku rows at the doorstep — many of them people you never formally invited. Count the families you expect, multiply by 1.20, and round up to the next 50 so you stay on a clean MOQ. A ground-floor flat in Medavakkam or Velachery with 40 expected families should order 50; an apartment association with 95 flats should order 120 and keep the extras for the Deepavali stock. Always keep the surplus rather than cutting it fine — a metal diya does not expire, and families who miss out on Karthigai evening remember it. Three more planning notes. First, decide early whether you are giving one item or a set, because a set changes both your budget and your packing time: a diya plus a kumkum box inside a jute bag takes about two minutes per guest to assemble, so 150 sets is a full evening of work for two people. Second, keep the heavier German silver and copper pieces for a named short list and write the names down, otherwise they get handed out at random in the first hour. Third, place the bulk order at least three weeks before 24 November 2026, because November is peak season for us and the lighter diya and kumkum designs move fast. Illustrative Order Breakdown: for 150 guests, 150 colourful enamel brass lotus diyas at about ₹100 each comes to about ₹15,000, and 150 heritage thambulam bags at about ₹40 each comes to about ₹6,000 — about ₹21,000 in total for a complete bag-plus-diya gift at about ₹140 a head. Courier or parcel service charges are extra and billed at actuals based on weight and destination. If you want a short deluxe list on top, add 15 engraved brass pooja plates at about ₹250 each, which is another ₹3,750. Commercial bill / invoice provided for company accounting.
Ordering from Our Studio — Tamil Nadu, India and Overseas
- ✓ Our studio is at 4/721, Madurai Veeran Koil Street, Sentamil Nagar, Medavakkam, Chennai - 600100, open 9:00 AM to 9:00 PM IST. Please call or WhatsApp before you come so we can keep the Karthigai samples ready — Medavakkam, Tambaram, Velachery, Sholinganallur and OMR customers often drive down to see brass and German silver finishes in person, because metal always looks different in the hand than on a screen.
- ✓ You can collect from the studio yourself, or book your own Porter pickup for urgent in-stock items and have the box reach you the same day inside Chennai. For everything else we dispatch through ST Courier, DTDC, Professional and India Post (express), and for heavy bulk cartons we use MSS Parcel Service and Rathimeena Parcel Service by bus and lorry parcel to Tamil Nadu districts, Bangalore and Kerala.
- ✓ In stock: dispatch in 24 to 48 hours. Chennai customers can book Porter or another delivery app for same-day delivery. Custom or not in stock: 7 to 10 working days. After dispatch, the delivery time depends on the courier's speed. Abroad we use DHL/FedEx, and customs clearance also affects the time. Brass, copper and glass items are wrapped individually in bubble and cushion packing and boxed with filler so pieces do not knock against each other in transit.
- ✓ For temple committees, apartment associations, trusts and company Karthigai distributions: Commercial bill / invoice provided for company accounting. Share your order list on WhatsApp and we will send a written quotation with per-piece rates, total quantity and the expected dispatch window before you pay anything.
- ✓ We supply Karthigai Deepam return gifts across all of Tamil Nadu — Chennai, Coimbatore, Madurai, Trichy, Salem, Tirunelveli, Erode, Tirupur, Vellore, Thanjavur and Pondicherry — and onward to the rest of South India, the whole of India, and to families abroad who send gifts home for the festival.
Answers for Hosts
Frequently Asked Questions
What should I give as a Karthigai Deepam return gift?
Give something connected to the lamp or the pooja room: a brass agal vilakku or enamel lotus diya, a five-diya tray, a kumkum chimizh, a pooja tray, or a kolam-printed jute thamboolam bag holding vetrilai paakku and manjal-kumkumam. At AA Gifts these run from about ₹12 for a small haldi-kumkum bottle holder to about ₹350 for a German silver pooja plate, with most Karthigai orders between about ₹50 and ₹180 a piece. Lamp-shaped and pooja-room items work best because the guest lights or uses them again at Deepavali and at every Friday pooja. Avoid anything purely decorative that has no use after the festival evening.
When is Karthigai Deepam 2026 and how early should I order?
Karthigai Deepam 2026 falls on 24 November 2026, the same evening as the Maha Deepam at Thiruvannamalai. The date follows the Tamil calendar — the Karthigai nakshatram in the month of Karthigai — so it changes every year and is not fixed to one English date. Place bulk orders at least three weeks ahead, because November is our busiest month and the popular diya and kumkum designs sell out first. If an item is in stock we dispatch in 24 to 48 hours, but custom work takes 7 to 10 working days, so leave room for that plus courier transit.
What are good Karthigai Deepam gifts under ₹50 and under ₹100?
Under ₹50 the strong Karthigai picks are lotus haldi-kumkum glass bottle holders at about ₹12, traditional bangle kumkum favour sets at about ₹15, silk brocade mini baskets for kumkum cups at about ₹20, peacock steel plates at about ₹25, heritage thambulam bags at about ₹40 and kolam-printed jute gift bags at about ₹45. Under ₹100 you can add kolam-printed jute thamboolam bag sets at about ₹50, Lord Murugan canvas return gift bags at about ₹65, kolam-print green jute bags with wooden handles at about ₹80, and enamel brass lotus diyas, peacock five-diya trays, metal kumkum boxes and lotus-printed steel trays at about ₹100. For street or apartment-wide distribution most buyers choose a jute bag plus one small metal item, which lands the whole gift under ₹100 a head.
What is the minimum order quantity, and can I mix designs?
The minimum order is 50 pieces per design. Mixed orders are supported on request — for example 100 brass lotus diyas for the general crowd plus 20 German silver pooja plates for elders and temple trustees in the same order. Send your full list on WhatsApp and we will confirm whether the mix works and send a written quotation with per-piece rates before any payment. This is how most apartment associations and temple committees order for Karthigai Deepam.
Do you deliver Karthigai gifts across Tamil Nadu, other states and abroad?
Yes. In stock: dispatch in 24 to 48 hours; Chennai customers can book Porter or another delivery app for same-day delivery. Custom or not in stock: 7 to 10 working days. After dispatch, the delivery time depends on the courier's speed (abroad it also depends on customs clearance). We ship through ST Courier, DTDC, Professional and India Post (express), and send heavy bulk cartons by MSS Parcel Service and Rathimeena Parcel Service to Tamil Nadu, Bangalore and Kerala. Brass, copper and glass pieces are individually wrapped in bubble and cushion packing before boxing.
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