Karka lagna · vimshottari
The Ketu Mahadasha for Cancer Ascendant
7 years · Ketu rules no house
The Parashari way to read a mahadasha for a given ascendant starts with the houses its lord holds. For Cancer ascendant Ketu holds none: the nodes rule no sign in whole-sign lordship, so the 7-year Ketu mahadasha for Cancer is read through the lord of the sign Ketu occupies at birth, and through that sign’s house from Cancer, which no table can supply without the chart.
Ketu is exalted on the commoner reckoning in Scorpio, the 5th from Cancer, and debilitated by the same reckoning in Taurus, the 11th; planets.js records other signs as well. Ketu counts the Moon, Cancer’s lagna lord, an enemy; the Moon’s own row names no node, so the reverse has no entry. Ketu’s own nakshatras fall in Ashwini (the 10th), Magha (the 2nd) and Mula (the 6th) for Cancer ascendant, which is where a birth that opens in the Ketu mahadasha has its Moon.
The Nine Sub-Periods, by Lordship for Cancer
| # | Antardasha | Length (classical) | Its lord rules, for Cancer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ketu–Ketu | 4 months 27 days | no house |
| 2 | Ketu–Venus | 1 year 2 months | the 4th and the 11th |
| 3 | Ketu–Sun | 4 months 6 days | the 2nd |
| 4 | Ketu–Moon | 7 months | the 1st |
| 5 | Ketu–Mars | 4 months 27 days | the 5th and the 10th |
| 6 | Ketu–Rahu | 1 year 18 days | no house |
| 7 | Ketu–Jupiter | 11 months 6 days | the 6th and the 9th |
| 8 | Ketu–Saturn | 1 year 1 month 9 days | the 7th and the 8th |
| 9 | Ketu–Mercury | 11 months 27 days | the 3rd and the 12th |
For Cancer ascendant, three of the Ketu mahadasha’s sub-periods belong to lords of a dusthana (the 6th, 8th or 12th): Ketu–Jupiter, Ketu–Saturn and Ketu–Mercury, and two to lords of a trikona other than the 1st: Ketu–Mars and Ketu–Jupiter. The sub-period of the Moon, Cancer’s lagna lord, is Ketu–Moon, the fourth of nine, 7 months long. Counted in time, sub-periods whose lords hold a dusthana for Cancer take 3 years 12 days (43%) of the Ketu mahadasha’s 7 years, and those whose lords hold a trikona other than the 1st take 1 year 4 months 3 days (19%); a lord holding both is counted in both. In the Ketu mahadasha for Cancer, the Rahu and Ketu sub-periods are read through their dispositors in the chart, since neither node rules a house.
For a Cancer-rising chart this is the frame of the Ketu mahadasha, not a forecast: where Ketu and each sub-period lord actually sit, and their dignity there, decide what it comes to, and this page cannot know either.
Related
For Cancer or any other ascendant, the Ketu mahadasha’s sub-period arithmetic, with the nine pratyantars of each, is on the Ketu mahadasha table; the Cancer chart house by house on the Cancer ascendant page. How the Ketu mahadasha is read in general is in our Ketu mahadasha article, and the system in Vimshottari dasha explained.