Kalyani Nandurkar wrote:
In Maharashtra, we celebrate Bhogi one day prior to Makar Sankrant, which is today. We prepare bajra bhakri sprinkled with sesame seeds, a veggie preparation containing a mix of all seasonal veggies such as carrots, peas, green chana, brinjal, different types of vaals etc, the bhaji is seasoned with roasted sesame and peanuts which are coarsely ground. Bajra bhakri, this veggie preparation is eaten accompanied with fresh butter and rice and moong dal khichadi.
Tomorrow for Sankrant, we prepare til gul which is sweet prepared using combination of jaggery, sesame and peanuts, either in laddoo form or a flat cakes like barfi. We also prepare gul poli, which is crispy thin rotis stuffed with jaggery and sesame stuffing, served with dollops of ghee.
We too have something similar like till gul here on sankranti which falls today. But we don't add any peanuts only jaggery and black sesame seeds. Its believe that those who don't eat such sesame-jaggery sweet on sankranti will not be born as human being in their next birth but as a dog.
Here people look forward to sankranti celebration as the days gets longer after sankranti.