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In short
A chara rashi is a movable sign: Aries, Cancer, Libra or Capricorn, the first of every three signs in BPHS's repeating order. This app uses the label to start the Navamsa count, to set rashi drishti, to find the Badhaka house of a movable Ascendant and to detect Rajju Yoga.
What the term means
Chara means "moving". The chara rashis are the four movable signs: Mesha, Karka, Tula and Makara. They are one of three sign qualities, with the fixed and the dual signs. The word is not the same "Chara" as in Chara Dasha or Chara karaka; the code notes that the shared name is all those have in common.
Where the term comes from
BPHS Ch. 4 Sl. 5 gives the order "Movable, Fixed and Dual" for the twelve signs, repeating from Mesh, and Saravali Ch. 3 Sl. 20-21 uses the Sanskrit name Chara. BPHS then builds several rules on it: a movable sign's Navansh is counted from the sign itself (Ch. 6 Sl. 12); it aspects the three fixed signs except the one next to it (Ch. 8 Sl. 1-3); all grahas in movable signs make Rajju Yog (Ch. 35 Sl. 7); and the 11th sign from a movable sign is its Badhak (Ch. 50 Sl. 20-21). Saravali Ch. 3 Sl. 13 calls the first Navamsa of a movable sign Vargottama. BPHS Ch. 46 Sl. 168-169 also gives movable signs 7 years in the Sthir Dasha, a system this app does not compute.
How this app uses it
- Label: MODALITY_BY_SIGN marks Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn "movable".
- Navamsa: the count starts from the sign itself, so a planet in the first 3°20' of a movable sign is vargottama, matching Saravali.
- Rashi drishti: Aries aspects Leo, Scorpio and Aquarius; Cancer aspects Taurus, Scorpio and Aquarius; Libra aspects Taurus, Leo and Aquarius; Capricorn aspects Taurus, Leo and Scorpio.
- Badhaka: for a movable Ascendant it is the 11th house, and the strength reading notes any graha placed there.
- Yogas: when all seven grahas sit in movable signs the engine reports Rajju Yoga.
- Other uses: the D16, D20 and D45 counts start from Aries for a movable sign, and the Chara Dasha's tie-break ranks a movable sign below fixed and dual ones.
Pages that use this term
- Navamsa: the second chart - how the movable-sign start shapes the D9.
- Aries (Mesha Rashi) - the first movable sign.
- Capricorn (Makara Rashi) - the last movable sign of the four.
- Rajju Yoga - all grahas in movable signs.
- Navamsa (D9) calculator - applies the movable-sign rule to your chart.
- Yogas calculator - reports Rajju Yoga when it forms.