Saturn Mahadasha, Rahu Antardasha (Shani–Rahu)

The Rahu antardasha is the eighth of the nine sub-periods inside the Saturn mahadasha. 19 × 18 ÷ 120 makes the Saturn–Rahu sub-period 2 years 10 months 6 days on the classical year of twelve thirty-day months, which is how the texts state it, or 1041 days on the solar year of 365.2425 days that the dasha calculator uses.

Rahu’s turn in the Saturn mahadasha comes only after Saturn, Mercury, Ketu, Venus, the Sun, the Moon and Mars have run, which takes 13 years 7 months 12 days. When the Saturn–Rahu sub-period gives way to Saturn–Jupiter, 2 years 6 months 12 days of the Saturn mahadasha remains.

Rahu’s 18 years make every Rahu antardasha 18/120 of the mahadasha containing it, so inside Saturn’s 19 years the Saturn–Rahu sub-period is the third-longest of the nine.

The Nine Pratyantardashas of Saturn–Rahu

A pratyantardasha of Saturn–Rahu is 19 × 18 × its own lord’s years ÷ 14,400, and the nine run in cycle order starting from Rahu. Venus’s is the longest inside Saturn–Rahu at 171 days and the Sun’s the shortest at 51 days, on the classical year and rounded to the day.

How Saturn and Rahu Stand to Each Other

Rahu’s row in the friendship lists counts Saturn a friend. Saturn’s row names no node, so the other direction of the Saturn–Rahu relationship has no entry, and this page does not supply one. The nodes have no row in the seven-graha table that kundli matching uses; the node’s own entry is the one printed on its planet page.

Rahu owns no sign in the standard scheme, so the Saturn–Rahu sub-period has no fixed distance between lordships. What stands in for it is the node’s dispositor — the lord of the sign Rahu occupies at birth — which differs from chart to chart.

The Same Pair the Other Way Round: Rahu–Saturn

19 × 18 equals 18 × 19, so the Saturn antardasha of the Rahu mahadasha is exactly as long as Saturn–Rahu: 2 years 10 months 6 days. Nothing else about Rahu–Saturn matches. It is the third sub-period of Rahu’s 18 years rather than the eighth of Saturn’s 19; it opens after 5 years 1 month 6 days of the Rahu mahadasha, against 13 years 7 months 12 days here; and its pratyantars start from Saturn instead of Rahu.

What the Texts Assign to Saturn and Rahu

The karaka list the tables give Saturn, the mahadasha lord, is karma, labour, servants, iron, coal and delay itself; for Rahu, the lord of the Saturn–Rahu sub-period, it is foreign lands and foreigners, technology, aviation and politics. Parashari practice reads the sub-period through the houses each of the two owns and occupies in the birth chart (for Rahu, which owns none, the house it occupies and the lord of its sign), and through where Rahu stands counted from Saturn there. None of that is a forecast, and this page makes none: without a chart, Saturn–Rahu is a length and a position, and the 2 years 10 months 6 days above is the whole of what can be said about it in general.

A birth with the Moon in Pushya, Anuradha or Uttara Bhadrapada opens life inside the Saturn mahadasha itself, part-way through, and whether the Saturn–Rahu sub-period is still ahead depends on how far the Moon had gone into the nakshatra. For a birth in Ardra, Swati or Shatabhisha, the Rahu mahadasha comes first, and the Saturn mahadasha is the third in that sequence.

The Other Sub-Periods of the Saturn Mahadasha

The full table for the Saturn mahadasha, with where each sub-period opens and closes, is on the Saturn mahadasha page. How the Saturn mahadasha is read as a whole is in our Saturn mahadasha article, and the system itself in Vimshottari dasha explained. This page in Hindi: शनि महादशा में राहु अंतर्दशा.