The Main Planetary-Period System

The Vimshottari dasha is the principal planetary-period system of Vedic astrology, dividing a notional 120-year cycle among the nine grahas in a fixed order and set of lengths: Ketu seven years, Venus twenty, the Sun six, the Moon ten, and so on. The system times when the promise of a chart is delivered: each planet rules a period, or dasha, during which its results tend to unfold.

The starting point is taken from the Moon's nakshatra at birth, which fixes both the ruling planet of the first period and how much of it remains, so that no two charts run the cycle from the same point.