Muhurta Charts, Ghatika Lagna, Yogada & Special Yogas

Muhurta Charts for Political Candidacy

When Birth Data Is Hidden

• Many political leaders hide their birth data or float false charts. Sonia Gandhi has two or three charts with different lagnas, Karunanidhi has three, Chandrababu Naidu several. Vajpayee has two — one for 1924, one for 1926 — and the Parliament web page changed his date more than once. A few, like Jayalalitha, have only one.
• Even when the date is right, the time may be off by 5–10 minutes, and that is hard to rectify.
• The solution: the moment a leader takes the oath, files a nomination or accepts his party's nomination is public. Bush and Kerry accepted on live television; the Indian press prints the time a nomination is filed.
• A student asks whether the place of filing is taken as the birthplace. Yes — the place where the declaration is made is the place of birth of the candidacy, and the moment is its birth time.
• The oath chart shows how the term will go; the nomination chart shows the bid for power.

"More than the natal chart of a leader, the chart when he files nomination is very important."

• PVNR gave this chart more weight than the natal charts when he predicted that Bush would come back.

Mundane Charts — Key Rules

1. What is born is not a person — it is a candidacy or a presidency.
2. Divisional charts: Dasamsa for career, Drekkana for siblings, Saptamsa for children — none of that applies. Mundane charts use only 6 or 7 vargas, and what each stands for changes. PVNR leaves that for later.
3. Stick to the Rasi chart. House meanings stay the same but are applied to the candidacy, not to a human being:
   • 1H = the very existence
   • 2H = resources
   • 3H = initiative
   • 4H = comforts
   • 5H = abilities, popularity, recognition — the following and support one has; the house of power
   • 6H = obstacles and overcoming them
   • 7H = desires and pursuing them; relationships with people
   • 8H = setbacks, tensions, worries; sudden changes — usually bad, sometimes a sudden unexpected gain
   • 9H = the dharma followed and the protection it gives
   • 10H = karma, what is achieved
   • 11H = gains
   • 12H = losses
4. In a muhurta the first things to judge are how strong the lagna is and how strong the lagna lord is.

Example Chart Analysis — 2004 Election

Chart 1: Vajpayee Filing His Nomination (2004)

• PVNR does not have the data on this computer; it was reported on the Vedic Astrology Yahoo group. He recalls the chart: Cancer rising, lagna lord Moon in the 8th house, Aquarius.
• For any lagna, the lagna lord in the 8th is to be avoided — unless the muhurta is for an occult pursuit, some 8th-house matter. On the negative side the 8th shows tension, anxiety and suffering.
• It is worst for Moon: the 8th house is Moon's Marana Karaka Sthana.
• Rule: never choose a muhurta with Moon in the 8th house — whether or not Moon is the lagna lord. Lagna is the body, Moon the mind, Sun the soul. The mind should not be in anxiety over the thing being started.

Chart 2: John Kerry Accepting the Nomination

• July 29, 2004, 10:21 PM, 4 hours west of GMT, Boston (71°03′37″W, 42°21′30″N)
• Pisces lagna. Lagna lord Jupiter is in the 6th house, Leo.
• The house of power is the 5th: the 10th is the karma done, but popularity and following come from the 5th. Here the 5th is Cancer.
• Jupiter is in the 2nd from the 5th. The 2nd and 7th from any house are its maraka sthanas, so the lagna lord shows the end of the pursuit of power.
• Ghatika Lagna is in Capricorn. Jupiter is in the 8th from GL — a setback in the pursuit of power.
• Conclusion: not an auspicious muhurta for someone running for the presidency.

Chart 3: George Bush Accepting the Nomination

• September 2, 2004, 10:10:12 PM, 4 hours west of GMT, Manhattan (73°58′W, 40°47′N). Probably not a chosen muhurta — it is the one he ended up using.
• Aries lagna, at 25°.
• Lagna lord Mars with 5th lord Sun in the 5th house, Leo; Sun is in his own sign. The conjunction of lagna lord and 5th lord anywhere is a Raj Yoga. When it falls in lagna itself or in the 5th itself, Parasara calls it a Maharaja Yoga.

How close are the two planets?

• Sun is at 17° Leo, Mars at 21°08′ — 4°08′ apart.
• Within 6° a Raj Yoga is strong. Up to 10° it is acceptable. Beyond 10° it is not strong. Planets at the two ends of a sign give little.

Are they closing or separating? (a principle for mundane charts)

• Mars is slower and is ahead; Sun is faster and is behind. Sun will catch up with Mars, so the yoga will fructify in the near future.
• Had Sun been ahead of Mars, the gap would widen — a Raj Yoga already experienced, with results that keep shrinking.
• This is used in muhurta, Tithi Pravesha, Tajaka, solar-return and lunar-return charts. It is not used in natal charts.

Moon and Rahu in lagna

• In mundane charts Moon is the masses — the mind of the whole society. Moon with Rahu is bad: Rahu eclipses Moon.
• Rahu is at 10°45′ Aries, Moon at 7°05′, lagna at 25°. Rahu drifts slowly backward; Moon moves fast and forward.
• Moon reaches Rahu within days, in the sign that holds the lagna → a large loss of popularity, soon. A student points out it had already happened: Bush lost ground to Kerry (the first debate).
• Rahu, moving backward, never touches the lagna. Moon passes Rahu and goes on to reach the lagna at 25° → public support comes back to him.
• Had the lagna been at 6°, behind both, it would have been a disastrous muhurta whatever the Raj Yoga in the 5th.

Why this muhurta keeps power

• The Raj Yoga is between Sun and Mars — the Kshatriya planets, the king and the senapati, both fiery. Starting a bid for power under this muhurta, losing it is very unlikely.
• From these two charts alone: Bush stands a better chance than Kerry.

Mars is also the 8th lord

• A planet owning two signs gives the results of both, more of the stronger sign. The first measure of strength is the number of planets: Aries has two, Scorpio none. Mars gives mostly lagna-lord results.
• But the 8th lord in the 5th still gives instability, tension and anxiety about power. Not a bed of roses.

Rahu is a badhakesha in lagna

• For movable signs the 11th is the badhaka sthana, for fixed signs the 9th, for dual signs the 7th. For Aries it is Aquarius, owned by Saturn and Rahu.
• One of its lords, Rahu, sits in lagna → problems of an unseen kind, with no explanation. The shastras link these to pishacha badha and preta badha — lost souls. PVNR reads it as inexplicable tensions for him, perhaps on account of the people who lost their lives because of him.

Combustion (a student asks: Mars is combust)

• Mars is the planet least bothered by combustion. Fire is not afraid of fire; the senapati is not afraid of the king.
• In PVNR's opinion and his father's, combustion matters little for Jupiter too.
• Venus is the worst — a watery planet, and Sun evaporates the water.
• Mercury is also hurt, but he is Sun's friend, and the conjunction gives Budha-Aditya Yoga (also called Nipuna Yoga): learned, capable.
  • Some say Sun and Mercury should be close but not too close. PVNR's view: the yoga is strongest when they are very close. Mercury is the learning ability, Sun the soul; when the two are close, the ability is either overwhelmed or the person learns a great deal.
  • In the Rasi chart about half of humanity has it, so it says little there. It counts far more in the Dasamsa (D-10) and the Siddhamsa (D-24).

Ghatika Lagna (GL) / Ghati Lagna

Definition

• The ordinary lagna shows the basic existence. Ghatika Lagna shows existence from the point of view of power and authority.

How to Use GL

1. See which house GL occupies from lagna — power comes in that way:
   • GL in 3H → through initiative and determination
   • GL in 5H → through popularity, through followers
   • GL in 6H → through hard work, patiently overcoming obstacles
   • GL in 7H → through a strong desire, or through the people one knows
   • GL in 8H → something sudden and unexpected; a setback, and then power comes unexpectedly
2. A GL in a hard house is not bad in itself. Take GL as lagna and see which planets are well placed from it.

In the Two Muhurta Charts

• Bush: GL is in Scorpio, the 8th from lagna → power after a setback. Mars and Sun in Leo are in the 10th from GL, the house of achievement. They are well placed from both lagna and GL.
• Kerry: lagna lord Jupiter is in the 8th from GL → a setback to his pursuit of power.

Yogada

Definition

"If a planet associates with lagna and ghatika lagna, both, then it becomes a yogada."

What Counts as Association

• Owning the sign
• Occupying the sign
• Rasi drishti on the sign
• A student asks later whether graha drishti counts. No — only rasi drishti. "That is what I was taught."

Yogada in Bush's Muhurta Chart

• Mars owns the lagna (Aries) and owns the GL (Scorpio) → Yogada. He is the planet that promises power.
• Mars → war, fight, security, defense. That is the issue that brings him power.
• The planet in the maraka sthana from power is Jupiter, in Virgo, the 2nd from the 5th. Jupiter shows finance and banking; in a sign of Mercury, the planet of trade, he shows the economy. The economy is a bad issue for him — it would kill his pursuit of power.
• A student notes that Jupiter is the 12th lord in the 6th, a Vipareeta Raj Yoga. PVNR agrees, but Jupiter is also the 9th lord; which of Sagittarius and Pisces is stronger is left aside.
• Which dasha to use with a muhurta chart is not clear, so PVNR does not time anything from it.

Graha Malika Yoga

Definition

• Four or more consecutive signs, each occupied by a planet (some say four, some five). Not every planet has to be in the chain — but no sign in it may be empty.
• Rahu and Ketu count. Use all nine, Sun to Ketu.

Results

• An auspicious yoga: some great achievement.
• Seed = the planet in the first sign of the garland — what the achievement starts with.
• Culmination = the planet in the last sign — what it ends in.
• The yoga is given by occupants, not lords. Read the planet sitting in the first sign, not that sign's lord.

Bush's Muhurta Chart

• Saturn (Gemini) → Venus (Cancer) → Sun, Mars, Mercury (Leo) → Jupiter (Virgo) → Ketu (Libra). Five signs.
• Seed = Saturn → hard, low-level, routine work. To get what this muhurta promises he needs a strong ground operation.
• Culmination = Ketu → religiousness of a stubborn, headless kind: fundamentalists, evangelicals, people who do not use the head to decide. (Rahu and Ketu can also show terrorism — Rahu the head that plans, Ketu the headless one who carries it out.) Ketu also shows fulfilment of desires. Here: pushing a conservative agenda.
• The muhurta does not end with the election. The garland has not reached its last sign; its full effect comes in the next four years.
• When exactly? Hard to say. PVNR knows no dasha that works consistently for muhurta charts.

Kala Sarpa and Kala Amrita Yoga

Definition

All the planets hemmed between Rahu and Ketu, as taught in this class:

• Rahu, then all the planets, then Ketu → Kala Amrita Yoga
• Ketu, then all the planets, then Rahu → Kala Sarpa Yoga

Results

• Kala Sarpa: a highly problematic yoga. It brings down the other yogas of the chart. The person may become like Rahu — bhoga marga; a scoundrel, a great thief.
• Kala Amrita: again many setbacks, and other yogas may not deliver, but in the end the person becomes very religious and spiritual, a kind of saint — moksha marga.
• Rahu puts the person on bhoga marga, Ketu on moksha marga.

Exceptions

Different schools give different exceptions. PVNR lists them and leaves them for a later class:

• a planet in a kendra
• an exalted planet
• some say only an exalted planet in a kendra — in effect a Mahapurusha Yoga — breaks it
• Lagna outside the Rahu–Ketu half: some say the yoga is then minimal. The verses speak only of planets, not of lagna.

How Long It Lasts

• It acts through life, but in the early 40s — around 43 or 44 — important events come and the person is able to break out of it. Until then there are setbacks.
• With Kala Amrita you would rather it did not break, but it breaks all the same.
• When it breaks, the person can turn very spiritual — a thief can become a great sadhu, like Valmiki.

Bush's Charts

• A student notices the pattern in the nomination chart. PVNR adds that Bush's natal chart has it too: Rahu in Taurus, Ketu in Scorpio, every planet in Gemini, Cancer, Leo and Virgo.
• In the nomination chart Moon and Rahu are both in Aries, but Moon (7°) is behind Rahu (10°45′). So the order is Moon, then Rahu, then all the other planets, then Ketu. Moon is in the other half and breaks it — no Kala Amrita Yoga in that chart.
• A student asks: Moon will cross Rahu within days — does the yoga then come later? PVNR knows of no teaching in the classics either way. Where the Maharshis have given no view, do not rule a thought out; consider it and form an opinion.

Sarpa Yoga and Mala Yoga

Sarpa Yoga

• Three malefics in the quadrants from lagna. A different yoga from Kala Sarpa.
• Parasara's result: very unlucky, very wretched. A snake around the neck in place of a garland. Take two steps forward and get pushed back three.
• Such people are also curt and rude — under constant trouble it is hard to be gentle. If someone has many problems and is still gentle with people, it is probably some other yoga.

Mala Yoga

• Three benefics in the quadrants from lagna — a garland of flowers around the neck. Lucky and fortunate.

Checked in Bush's Nomination Chart

• The quadrants are Aries, Cancer, Libra, Capricorn. Rahu is in Aries, Ketu in Libra; Cancer has no malefic and Capricorn is empty. Two malefics → no Sarpa Yoga.
• A student points out that Moon, in Krishna paksha, is a malefic too and sits in lagna. PVNR: a good point, but Moon is not usually counted for Sarpa Yoga.