Getting the Chart Right
Choosing an Ayanamsa
What each ayanamsa anchors to, why this school uses Pushya-paksha, and the one rule that matters more than the choice.
What each ayanamsa anchors to
The stars don't draw the line
"Fixed against the stars" still leaves a question: fixed where? No star sits exactly at 0° Aries with a label on it.
Each ayanamsa answers that question by picking an anchor, a star placed at an agreed position. Different anchors give slightly different zero points.
All the ayanamsas in this chapter are sidereal. They disagree about the exact starting line by around a degree, not about which zodiac to use.
Lahiri, or Chitra-paksha
Lahiri anchors to the star Chitra (Spica), placing it opposite 0° Aries, at 0° Libra. You met Chitra in the Nakshatras chapter, straddling Virgo and Libra. Hence the other name, Chitra-paksha: the Chitra side.
It was adopted in 1955 by India's Calendar Reform Committee for the national almanac and named after N. C. Lahiri. It is the most widely used ayanamsa in India; most almanacs and most charts you'll find online use it.
It is defined by a formula rather than by tracking the star to the arcsecond. Computed in this app's engine, Lahiri puts Spica at 179°59′, a hair short of 0° Libra.
True Chitra
True Chitra keeps the same anchor but holds Spica at exactly 0° Libra on every date, following the star's own small motion.
In practice it sits within about one arcminute of Lahiri across the 20th and 21st centuries. That's too small to change any sign, nakshatra or pada except in a genuinely borderline case.
Pushya-paksha
Pushya-paksha anchors to a different star: the star of Pushya nakshatra (delta Cancri), placed at exactly 16° Cancer, inside Pushya nakshatra's own span. It was developed by P. V. R. Narasimha Rao, and Jagannatha Hora lists it as True Pushya-paksha.
The difference from Lahiri, computed with this app's engine from 1900 to 2026, holds steady at about 1°08′. Pushya-paksha's ayanamsa is the smaller number (23°05′ against Lahiri's 24°14′ in 2026). Because sidereal longitude is tropical minus ayanamsa, every graha and the lagna land about 1°08′ further along the zodiac on Pushya-paksha.
KP keeps its own
Krishnamurti Paddhati always uses Krishnamurti's own ayanamsa, about 6′ below Lahiri.
This app locks KP to it whatever a person's other setting says. KP's fine sub-divisions were built in that frame, and moving them by a degree would reassign them. Parashari work follows the person's ayanamsa; KP work doesn't.
Remember it
Lahiri and True Chitra put Spica at 0° Libra, one by formula and one exactly. Pushya-paksha puts Pushya's star at 16° Cancer and runs 1°08′ ahead. KP keeps its own.
One frame at a time
Why this school defaults to Pushya-paksha
This school follows PVR Narasimha Rao's integrated approach, as Foundations told you. Pushya-paksha is his ayanamsa, and the engine's reference charts are checked against Jagannatha Hora set to it. A school needs one frame, so a quiz answer never depends on which ayanamsa you happened to pick.
That is the reason for the default. It is not a claim that Lahiri is wrong. Lahiri is a careful, official standard used by more astrologers than any other, and which star makes the best anchor is a question careful astrologers still research. You can learn good Jyotish on either.
The rabbit-hole advice is half right
A common reply to beginners: "Don't go down the ayanamsa rabbit hole, just start with Lahiri."
The half that's right: don't agonise. These ayanamsas are all sidereal and about a degree apart. Your time is better spent learning to read.
The half that's missing: you must know which frame a chart is in, and you must never compare across frames. Cast yourself on Lahiri on one site, read a Pushya-paksha interpretation here, and you'll find "disagreements" about your pada or your dasha dates that aren't in the sky at all. They come from mixing two measuring tapes.
Pick a frame, know you picked it, and stay in it.
One birth, two ayanamsas
One real moment, a morning in April 1990 in Bengaluru, cast by this app's engine both ways:
| | Pushya-paksha | Lahiri |
|---|---|---|
| Lagna | Gemini 17°55′ | Gemini 16°46′ |
| Sun | Pisces 27°32′, Revati pada 4 | Pisces 26°23′, Revati pada 3 |
| Moon | Virgo 28°46′, Chitra 2 | Virgo 27°38′, Chitra 2 |
| Rahu | Capricorn 20°37′, Shravana 4 | Capricorn 19°29′, Shravana 3 |
Step by step: every row moved about 1°08′. No sign changed, and neither did the lagna sign or the Moon's nakshatra. The Sun's pada did: Revati pada 4 begins at Pisces 26°40′. And since a pada is a navamsa (the Vargas chapter), the Sun is in Pisces navamsa, so vargottama, on Pushya-paksha, and in Aquarius navamsa on Lahiri.
The Mars mahadasha running at birth starts about seven months apart in the two frames.
What moves and what doesn't
A 1°08′ shift behaves predictably:
- Signs change only for a graha or lagna within 1°08′ of a sign boundary. That's uncommon but real, and if it's the lagna, every whole-sign house changes with it.
- Nakshatras (13°20′) change a little more often. Padas and navamsas (3°20′) change quite often.
- Dasha dates shift for everyone. The Moon moves 1°08′ of a 13°20′ nakshatra, about 8.5% of the first dasha lord's years, and every later date moves by the same amount: about six months if that lord is the Sun (6 years), and about 1.7 years if it's Venus (20 years).
That last line is why the frame matters most for timing questions.
Where the setting lives
In this school, every chart is cast on Pushya-paksha: the teaching charts and your own saved charts. There is no switch here, which keeps every quiz and drill in one frame.
In the suite's reading app, you can set Lahiri or True Chitra for a person. The setting belongs to the person, not to one question, so their dasha dates don't change halfway through a conversation. It exists for someone whose family astrologer or almanac uses Lahiri and needs dates that line up. KP stays on its own ayanamsa either way.
In Jagannatha Hora, the ayanamsa is a calculation preference. Choose True Pushya-paksha if you want its numbers to match this school's.
Remember it
1°08′: rarely a sign, sometimes a star, often a pada, always the dasha dates. Know your frame, and never compare across two.
Terms introduced here
- What an ayanamsa anchors to
- Lahiri and True Chitra anchor to Chitra (Spica) opposite 0° Aries; Pushya-paksha anchors to Pushya's star at 16° Cancer; KP keeps its own.
- One frame at a time
- This school casts on Pushya-paksha, PVR's ayanamsa. The real rule is to know which frame a chart uses and never compare across frames.
- What an ayanamsa changes
- About 1°08′ between Pushya-paksha and Lahiri: rarely a sign, sometimes a pada or navamsa, and every dasha date by months.