Mount Mary Basilica & the Bandra Fair: Mumbai's Great Church Festival

On a low hill above Bandra’s Bandstand, about 80 metres over the Arabian Sea, stands a butter-yellow church that half of Mumbai seems to have prayed at least once. This is the Basilica of Our Lady of the Mount — Mount Mary to everyone who knows it — and for one week each September the quiet lanes below it turn into the Bandra Fair, the city’s oldest and largest Catholic festival. What makes it worth your time is not grandeur; the basilica is handsome rather than vast. It is the mix. Koli fisherfolk, East Indian families whose people have farmed and fished this coast for centuries, Goans, Mangaloreans, and a great many Hindus and Muslims all climb the same steps to light a candle. Below is a first-hand, practical guide to the shrine, the fair, the wax offerings that puzzle first-timers, and how to manage the famous September crowds.

A hilltop shrine with a 300-year story

The Jesuits raised a chapel on this hill in the seventeenth century, when Bandra was a Portuguese village of paddy fields and fishing hamlets. The church has been knocked down and rebuilt more than once. In 1700, Arab raiders are said to have damaged the statue of Mary, cutting off its right hand while looking for gold; the church itself was destroyed in 1738 during the Maratha campaign against the Portuguese at Bassein. It was rebuilt around 1760, and the present structure dates to 1904.

The statue at the heart of it all has its own legend, and it is a good one. A Koli Christian fisherman is said to have dreamed of a statue floating in the sea; the next morning it was found bobbing in the water off Bandra, and locals took it for a miracle. That is the origin story of both the shrine’s devotion and the fair. Bandra’s people affectionately call the image Moti Mauli, “Pearl Mother”. In 1954 the statue was granted a papal decree of canonical coronation, and the church is today a minor basilica — the “basilica” you see on the signboards.

You do not need to be Catholic, or religious at all, to appreciate it. The interior is cool and calm, with stained glass and a much-loved image of the Madonna and Child above the altar. Step out to the front and you get a clean sweep of the sea. It costs nothing to enter.

The Bandra Fair: what actually happens

The feast marks the Nativity of Mary on 8 September. In practice the celebration is built around the Sunday on or after that date, preceded by a nine-day novena and followed by a week-long fair running to the “octave” Sunday — a stretch of roughly a fortnight in all. To picture it: in 2025 the novena ran from 5 to 13 September, the feast fell on Sunday 14 September, and the octave closed the following Sunday, 21 September. Dates shift each year with the calendar, so check the basilica’s own site (mountmarybasilicabandra.in) for the current schedule before you plan.

During the fair the roads around the church — Mount Mary Road and the steps leading down towards Bandstand — fill with stalls, fairy lights and a slow river of people. Lakhs of pilgrims come over the week. It is loud, warm and generous-spirited: part pilgrimage, part street fair, part family day out.

The wax stalls and candles

The stalls that stop every newcomer are the wax sellers. Alongside ordinary devotional candles you will find wax models of houses, cars, boats, and — most strikingly — human body parts: hands, feet, legs, hearts, even a whole tiny figure. The idea is simple and old. You offer a wax figure of the thing you are praying for. Hoping to buy a home, you offer a little wax house; praying over a bad knee or a sick child, you offer the matching wax limb, and light a candle for the intention. Whether or not you share the belief, it is a quietly moving thing to watch. A candle costs only a few rupees; the moulded wax figures run from around Rs 50 upward depending on size.

What to eat

The food is a large part of why regulars come back. The stalls are a roll-call of Christian and coastal sweets and snacks: choris pao (spicy Goan-style sausage stuffed into a bread roll), kala channa (spiced black chickpeas), and the fair’s signature sugar-coated sweet sticks, kadyo-bodyo. Look, too, for guava cheese (perad) from Goa, Kerala and Calicut halwa, mawa peda, groundnut chikki and slabs of petha. A choris pao or a paper cone of sweets rarely costs more than Rs 100. It is street food, so eat where the queue is longest and turnover is quick.

The fair is also the easiest window into East Indian cooking — the cuisine of Bombay’s original Catholic community, distinct from Goan food in that it leans far less on coconut and pivots instead on the community’s fiercely guarded “bottle masala”, a blend of dozens of roasted spices. Dishes to know are pork sorpotel (dark, semi-dry, tangy), vindaloo, potato chops, the fried sweet-savoury dumplings called fugias, and the festive wedding rice. You will find these more reliably in Bandra’s East Indian homes and a few local kitchens than at the stalls themselves, but the fair is the moment the community is most visible.

Mass timings and visiting the basilica

On ordinary days the basilica keeps a gentle rhythm: weekday masses in the early morning (around 6:30 and 7:30 am), with several more on Sunday mornings from about 6:30 to 9:30 am. The church is generally open for quiet visits from roughly 8 am to 8:30 pm, with a short midday break on weekdays; Sundays it opens later, around 10:30 am. Wednesday is the traditional novena day and draws the biggest weekly crowds all year round, so a weekday other than Wednesday is calmest for a peaceful look.

During the feast the schedule expands enormously — masses run through the day from about 5:30 am, including evening services, and are said in a rotation of languages (Konkani, Marathi, Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, Hindi and Gujarati among them) to serve the mix of communities. Those timings change each year, so confirm them on the notice board or the official site.

Etiquette is simple. Dress modestly — this is a working church, and during mass especially, keep shoulders covered. Switch phones to silent inside, keep photography discreet during services, and join the candle queue rather than jumping it.

Getting there and handling the crowds

The basilica sits above Bandstand, Bandra West. The practical arrival point is Bandra station (Western and Harbour lines), about 3 km away — take an auto or taxi to “Mount Mary” (every driver knows it), or walk west through Hill Road and Chapel Road if you fancy the stroll. BEST buses run from outside Bandra station towards the church through the day.

During the fair, plan around the crush. Come on a weekday if you can, and early in the morning or after about 8 pm rather than the Sunday-evening peak. Roads around the church are closed to most traffic, so expect to walk the last stretch regardless. Carry water, wear shoes you can stand in for a while, keep valuables zipped and close in the crowd, and settle a fare with the auto before you set off. If you are only after a calm visit and not the fair itself, simply avoid the September feast fortnight — the rest of the year the shrine is serene.

Make a half-day of it

The beauty of Mount Mary is how much sits within a short walk.

Bandra Bandstand

The 1.2-km seafront promenade runs right below the hill — a jogging track, sunset spot and people-watching bench by turns, lined with the sea on one side and, famously, the homes of a few film stars on the other. It is at its best in the hour before dusk.

Bandra Fort and Land’s End

A little further along is Castella de Aguada, the Bandra Fort, a Portuguese watchtower from 1640 perched at Land’s End. It is free, open-air, and gives you the cleanest view of the Bandra–Worli Sea Link arcing across the bay. Sunset here is one of the suburb’s small pleasures.

Chapel Road and St Andrew’s

On the walk up from the station, Chapel Road is worth slowing down for — its walls are covered in Bandra’s well-known street murals. Nearby St Andrew’s Church, one of the area’s oldest, is the parish the replacement Mount Mary statue is said to have come from, and rounds out a short circuit of the village’s Catholic heritage.

FAQ

When is the Bandra Fair held? It centres on the feast of the Nativity of Mary, 8 September, built around the Sunday on or near that date, with a nine-day novena before and a week-long fair after — roughly the first three weeks of September. Check the current year’s dates before you go.

What are the wax offerings about? Devotees offer a wax model of what they are praying for — a house, a car, or a body part matching an ailment — and light a candle with the intention. Candles cost a few rupees; wax figures start around Rs 50.

Do I have to be Christian to visit? Not at all. The shrine is known for drawing people of every faith, and visitors of all backgrounds are welcome year-round.

What should I eat there? Choris pao, kala channa and the sugar sticks called kadyo-bodyo are the fair classics, alongside Goan guava cheese and various halwas — most snacks well under Rs 100. It is also the best time to seek out East Indian dishes like sorpotel and fugias.

How do I reach Mount Mary? From Bandra station (Western/Harbour lines), take an auto or taxi to “Mount Mary”, about 3 km, or walk up via Hill Road and Chapel Road. During the fair, roads near the church are closed and you will walk the final stretch.

Is it very crowded? During the September feast, yes — lakhs come over the week. Visit on a weekday, early morning or late evening, to avoid the worst of it. Outside September it is quiet, with Wednesdays the busiest ordinary day.

The bottom line

Mount Mary rewards two very different visits. Come in September and you get the Bandra Fair in full cry — wax offerings, sausage rolls, sugar sticks and a good-natured crowd of every faith climbing the hill together, one of the most genuinely Mumbai things you can witness. Come on a quiet weekday and you get a calm, sea-lit church with three centuries of story behind its yellow walls, and a promenade and a Portuguese fort a few minutes’ walk away. Either way, go modestly dressed, go light in the pocket, and give yourself time to sit a while and take it in.