Once a year, Jains say Michhami Dukkadam to everyone they know. It arrives by message, in person, across families and continents, on a single day.
Almost everyone translates it as “sorry” or “forgive me”. That is not what it says, and the actual meaning is stranger and more demanding than the translation suggests.
The phrase
मिच्छा मि दुक्कडं · micchā mi dukkaḍaṃ
Ardhamagadhi Prakrit, the language of the earliest Jain canon.
Roughly: "May my misdeed be fruitless."
Word by word
| Prakrit | Sanskrit | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| micchā | mithyā | false, void, in vain, fruitless |
| mi | me | my, by me |
| dukkaḍaṃ | duṣkṛta | misdeed, badly done, wrongly done |
So the sentence is not “I apologise”. It is closer to: “may the wrong I did become void, bear no fruit, come to nothing.”
That is a request about karma, not about feelings. In the Jain framework an action binds karmic matter to the soul; the request is that this particular binding be dissolved rather than ripen. Which is why the phrase cannot work as a social pleasantry. A wrong is not voided by mentioning it. It is voided by genuine recognition, regret, and the resolve not to repeat it, and the words are the last step of that process, not a substitute for it.
How it is written
The phrase has travelled across two thousand years and several languages, so the spelling varies. None of the variants below is wrong.
| Script | Written | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Ardhamagadhi Prakrit | मिच्छा मि दुक्कडं | The canonical form, three separate words |
| Hindi Devanagari | मिच्छामि दुक्कड़म् | Run together, with the Sanskritised ending |
| Gujarati | મિચ્છામિ દુક્કડમ્ | The usual form in Gujarat and much of the diaspora |
| Roman, with diacritics | micchā mi dukkaḍaṃ | Scholarly transliteration |
Typed without diacritics it comes out as michhami dukkadam, micchami dukkadam, michami dukadam or mitchami dukadam, and every one of those is understood. The doubled consonants, cch and kk, are genuine Prakrit and worth keeping where you can, but nobody in a Jain household is going to correct your spelling on Samvatsari.
The Sanskrit equivalent, which you will sometimes see in older printed books, is mithyā me duṣkṛtam.
The verse it belongs to
Michhami Dukkadam is not a standalone greeting in the tradition. It sits inside pratikraman, and the sentiment is stated most completely in this verse, recited at Samvatsari:
खामेमि सव्वजीवे, सव्वे जीवा खमंतु मे।
मित्ती मे सव्वभूएसु, वेरं मज्झ न केणई॥
khāmemi savva-jīve, savve jīvā khamantu me
mittī me savva-bhūesu, veraṃ majjha na keṇavi
"I forgive all living beings. May all living beings forgive me.
I have friendship with all beings. I have enmity towards none."
Read the order of the two lines. You forgive first. Only then do you ask to be forgiven. That sequence is deliberate and it is the part most often dropped when the phrase travels alone.
And note the scope: savva-jīve, all living beings. Not everyone you have met. In a tradition that counts one-sensed beings in earth, water, fire, air and plants as living, the verse is addressed to the entire field of life you have moved through in a year, most of which you injured without noticing. That is the point. Jain ethics treats unintentional harm as real harm, less culpable but not zero, and the annual asking is aimed squarely at it.
When it is said
| Tradition | Occasion | Lunar date | 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shvetambara (most Murtipujak) | Samvatsari | Bhadrapada Shukla 4 | Tue 15 September |
| Shvetambara (many Sthanakvasi, Terapanth) | Samvatsari | Bhadrapada Shukla 5 | Wed 16 September |
| Digambara | Kshamavani Parva | Ashvina Krishna 1 | Sun 27 September |
Beyond the annual occasion it is also said in daily and fortnightly pratikraman, and in ordinary life the moment someone realises they have caused harm. The annual saying is the largest instance of a habit, not a once-a-year event in itself.
Full dates and both observances: Paryushana 2026.
Four things people get wrong
1. That it means “sorry”. It does not. “Sorry” reports a feeling. Michhami Dukkadam asks that a karmic consequence be nullified. You can feel sorry and change nothing; the phrase, said honestly, commits you to the change. This is the difference the translation loses.
2. That the other person’s reply settles it. It does not. If someone forgives you warmly and you did not mean the words, nothing has been dissolved. If someone refuses to forgive you and your regret was real, the work has still been done. The transaction is between you and your own karma. Their response is theirs.
3. That a forwarded message discharges it. The tradition asks you to say it to those you have actually wronged, and preferably to their face. A broadcast to a contact list is not forbidden and is not worthless, but it is the easy end of the practice. The person you least want to message is the one the day is for. If your list of recipients does not include a single uncomfortable name, the day has probably passed you by.
4. That it is a Jain-only formality. The doctrine underneath is general. Kshama, forgiveness, is the first of the ten dharmas contemplated during Das Lakshana, and it comes first for a structural reason: anger is one of the four kashayas, the passions that make karmic matter stick in the first place. Forgiving is not a courtesy extended to someone else. It is the removal of the thing in you that binds.
Saying it
Michhami Dukkadam is said with palms joined. A common fuller form is “Khamat khamna” in Gujarati usage, or the full verse where the setting allows.
If you are replying to someone who has said it to you, the reply is not “it’s okay”. Nothing is being excused. The reply is the same phrase back, or the second line of the verse: you also ask to be forgiven, because the year ran in both directions.
If you are sending it as a message
Most people will say Michhami Dukkadam this year by typing it, and it is worth being practical about that rather than disapproving. A message to someone you have not spoken to in ten years is a real act. The tradition never required an audience.
What a forwarded image does not do is name anything. Three things turn a message back into the practice: it is written to one person, it says what it is for, and it does not ask for anything in return. Some forms of words that do that:
To someone you know you wronged
"Michhami Dukkadam. I have been carrying the way I spoke to you last year and I would rather say it than let another year close over it. If I hurt you then, or since, in anything I did, said or failed to do, I ask you to forgive it. You do not owe me a reply."
To family and friends, no particular grievance
"Michhami Dukkadam. For anything I have done to hurt you this year, in word, thought or act, knowingly or without ever noticing, I ask your forgiveness. And whatever I was holding, I have put down. Khamemi savve jiva, savve jiva khamantu me."
To someone you have simply drifted from
"Michhami Dukkadam. We have not spoken in a long time, and I am not writing to repair that, only to say I hold nothing against you and to ask you to forgive whatever I did. I hope the year has been kind."
Use them as they are or rewrite them; the wording is not the point. The one worth sending first is the one you are putting off, which is the same conclusion the day arrives at from every direction.
The part that is genuinely difficult
A tradition that asks for annual, universal forgiveness has to deal with an obvious objection: some things should not be forgiven quickly, and pressure to forgive can be its own kind of harm.
Jain teaching does not ask you to pretend an injury did not happen, and it does not ask you to restore a relationship that harmed you. Kshama is the release of the anger you are carrying, which is described as a burden on the one carrying it. It is not a verdict on the other person’s conduct, an obligation to trust them again, or a requirement to say the injury was acceptable.
That distinction is worth holding onto, because the annual practice is sometimes used to press people into a reconciliation they have good reason to refuse. That use of the day inverts it. The verse says veraṃ majjha na keṇavi, I hold enmity towards none. It does not say you must return to what hurt you.
Frequently asked questions
↳ What does Michhami Dukkadam mean?
It means "may my misdeed be fruitless". The phrase is Ardhamagadhi Prakrit: micchā, false or void; mi, my; dukkaḍaṃ, misdeed. It is not an apology. It asks that the karma bound by a wrong action be dissolved rather than ripen, which is a request about karma, not a report of a feeling. Said without genuine recognition, regret and the resolve not to repeat the act, it does nothing at all.
↳ How do you reply to Michhami Dukkadam?
Not with "it's okay", because nothing is being excused. The reply is the same phrase back, or the second line of the Samvatsari verse, savve jīvā khamantu me, may all living beings forgive me. You ask to be forgiven in turn, because the year ran in both directions. In Gujarati usage "Khamat khamna" serves the same purpose. It is said with palms joined.
↳ When is Michhami Dukkadam said?
On Samvatsari, which most Shvetambara Murtipujak sanghs keep on Tuesday 15 September 2026 and many Sthanakvasi and Terapanth sanghs on Wednesday 16 September 2026. Digambara Jains exchange forgiveness at Kshamavani Parva on Sunday 27 September 2026. Beyond the annual occasion it is said in daily and fortnightly pratikraman, and in ordinary life the moment someone realises they have caused harm.
↳ Is Michhami Dukkadam Hindi or Prakrit?
Prakrit, specifically Ardhamagadhi, the language of the earliest Jain canon. The canonical spelling is मिच्छा मि दुक्कडं; you will also see मिच्छामि दुक्कड़म् in Hindi Devanagari and મિચ્છામિ દુક્કડમ્ in Gujarati, and the Sanskrit equivalent mithyā me duṣkṛtam in older books. It is not a Hindi phrase, which is part of why it does not translate cleanly into the everyday vocabulary of apology.