In South India, Kartikeya is worshipped as Murugan, who stands on top of mountains. On either side of him stand his two wives, Valli and Sena. Valli is a tribal girl, while Sena is a celestial princess, the daughter of Indra. There are songs of Murugan's virility and his romantic associations with his celestial and his earthly wives. It mirrors the idea of Vishnu with Sridevi and Bhudevi: Sridevi being the celestial wife of Vishnu and Bhudevi being the earthly wife of Vishnu. Thus, the divine connects the celestial realms and the earthly realms.

However, in North India, when people speak of Kartikeya, they speak of him as a celibate deity. In fact, there are temples near Kurukshetra, where it is said that Kartikeya not only chose to remain celibate, he rejected all things feminine, to the extent that he rejected the soft tissues of his body, which, according to Tantric sources, come from the mother.