Which dasha are you in? Vimshottari Mahadasha explained with years

Two people with the same rashi can have very different years. The reason is dasha. Your dasha is the planet in charge of your life right now, and it explains more about your present than any daily horoscope.

What is Vimshottari dasha?

It is the timing system given by Maharishi Parashara. A full cycle is 120 years, shared between nine planets in a fixed order. Each planet gets a set number of years, called its mahadasha.

The order and the years

• Ketu: 7 years
• Venus (Shukra): 20 years
• Sun (Surya): 6 years
• Moon (Chandra): 10 years
• Mars (Mangal): 7 years
• Rahu: 18 years
• Jupiter (Guru): 16 years
• Saturn (Shani): 19 years
• Mercury (Budh): 17 years

Where your cycle starts

Your first dasha is decided by your birth nakshatra. Each of the 27 nakshatras is ruled by one of the nine planets. If you were born in Ashwini, Magha or Mula, your life starts in Ketu dasha. Bharani, Purva Phalguni or Purva Ashadha start in Venus. Rohini, Hasta or Shravana start in the Moon, and so on.

How far the Moon had moved through the nakshatra at your birth decides how much of that first dasha was left. That is why you need an exact birth time for exact dasha dates.

Antardasha: the period inside the period

Each mahadasha is divided into nine antardashas, one for each planet, starting with the mahadasha’s own planet. An antardasha lasts from a few months to a little over three years. Most of the changes you actually feel, a new job, a marriage, a move, come when an antardasha changes.

How to read your dasha

• See which houses the dasha planet rules and which house it sits in. Those areas of life come alive.
• A planet that is exalted, in its own sign or in a good house gives its results easily.
• A planet in the 6th, 8th or 12th house asks for more effort and patience.
• Read the mahadasha planet and the antardasha planet together. Friends give smoother periods than enemies.

No dasha is all good or all bad. Even a difficult mahadasha has antardashas of real progress inside it.