Jyotisha, the Astrology of India

This section covers Jyotisha, the astrology of the Indian subcontinent, sometimes called Vedic astrology. Its defining feature is the sidereal zodiac, measured from a fixed point among the stars, in contrast to the tropical zodiac of Western astrology, which is measured from the moving equinox. The two zodiacs have drifted apart by roughly twenty-four degrees, so the same birth can yield different sign placements in the two systems, a difference of framework, not of error.

The section gathers the nine grahas (the planets, including the lunar nodes Rahu and Ketu), the twelve rashis (signs), the twenty-seven nakshatras (lunar mansions), the divisional vargas, the planetary-period systems such as the Vimshottari dasha, and the named planetary combinations, the yogas.