guide · janam kundli
How to Read Your Kundli, Step by Step
A kundli is a list of positions, and reading one starts with knowing where each position comes from. The steps below follow one example, a birth on 1 January 2000 at 06:00 IST in New Delhi, computed by the same code as the free kundli tool. It is an illustration of the method, not anyone’s chart.
1. The ascendant, and how firm it is
The ascendant (lagna) is the sign rising on the eastern horizon at the birth minute, and it needs the time and the place. In the example it is Scorpio, at 28.0°. That is close to the end of the sign: at New Delhi’s latitude Scorpio takes about 139 minutes to rise, so the ascendant would have moved into the next sign about 9 minutes later. A birth time that may be a few minutes out can change the ascendant, and with it every house; this is the first thing to check in any chart.
2. The twelve houses and their lords
With whole-sign houses, Scorpio is the 1st house, Sagittarius the 2nd, and so on; each house’s lord is its sign’s ruler. For Scorpio rising that makes Mars the lagna lord, Venus the 7th lord and the Sun the 10th lord. All twelve, with what each lord’s placement means arithmetically, are on the Scorpio ascendant page.
3. Each graha: sign, house, dignity, nakshatra
| Graha | Sign | House | Dignity | Nakshatra |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sun | Sagittarius 16° | 2nd | in a friend's sign | Purva Ashadha |
| Moon | Libra 13° | 12th | in a neutral sign | Swati |
| Mars | Aquarius 3° | 4th | in a neutral sign | Dhanishta |
| Mercury | Sagittarius 7° | 2nd | in a neutral sign | Mula |
| Jupiter | Aries 1° | 6th | in a friend's sign | Ashwini |
| Venus | Scorpio 7° | 1st | in a neutral sign | Anuradha |
| Saturn (R) | Aries 16° | 6th | debilitated | Bharani |
Each cell links to the page that explains that fact: the graha in the sign, the graha in the house, and the graha in the nakshatra. Read the sign first, for the graha’s dignity; then the house, for what part of the chart it sits in; then which houses it rules for this ascendant, on the Scorpio page. Rahu and Ketu are not in the table: this engine does not compute the nodes for a birth, so they are left out rather than placed approximately.
4. The Moon, and the dasha it sets
The Moon’s nakshatra, Swati pada 3 in the example, is the input to two other readings: the Vimshottari dasha timeline, explained step by step in how to read your dasha, and guna milan, explained in kundli matching by name and date of birth.
None of these positions is a prediction by itself. A chart is read by putting them together, and the honest result of doing that is a set of conditions, not a forecast of events.
Your own chart needs the date, time and place of birth; the first check is how close the ascendant sits to a sign boundary. The Free Kundli tool gives the Moon sign, nakshatra, Sun sign, lagna, the running dasha, and the sign and house of Mars, which is the headline answer; the Complete Janam Kundli works the same arithmetic further from your own birth details, and its page lists what it contains.
For the houses themselves see the 12 houses guide, and for the difference between the ascendant and the Moon sign, rashi and lagna. In Hindi: अपनी कुंडली कैसे पढ़ें.