--- title: "Karana in Panchang: Half a Tithi, and Bhadra" slug: "karana-in-panchang" canonical_url: "https://mahadasha.com/karana-in-panchang" description: "Karana in panchang is half a tithi. Why 11 karanas fill 60 slots, why four appear once a month, and why Vishti or Bhadra comes round eight times." published_date: "2026-08-05 09:00:00" modified_date: "2026-08-05 09:00:00" author: "Pawan Acharya" keywords: "karana in panchang, 11 karanas, vishti karana, bhadra karana, movable and fixed karana, karana today, how to calculate karana" locale: "en" --- # Karana in Panchang: Half a Tithi, and Bhadra > Eleven karanas fill the sixty half-tithis of a lunar month. Seven repeat eight times each, four appear once, and the arithmetic is exact. # Karana in Panchang: Half a Tithi, and Bhadra Karana in panchang is the smallest of the five limbs and the easiest to define: it is half a tithi. Where a tithi is 12° of separation between Moon and Sun, a karana is 6°, so exactly two karanas fill every tithi and 60 of them fill a lunar month. What makes it interesting is that those 60 slots are filled by only 11 names, and the way they are distributed is not even. Seven of the eleven repeat. Four appear once each per month and never again. Get that structure and the limb stops looking like an arbitrary list. ## Sixty slots, eleven names The seven repeating karanas are called *chara* or movable: Bava, Balava, Kaulava, Taitila, Garaja, Vanija and Vishti. They cycle continuously. The four fixed ones, *sthira*, are Shakuni, Chatushpada, Naga and Kimstughna. Each occupies one specific slot in the month and appears nowhere else. Count it out. Kimstughna takes the very first half-tithi of the lunar month, the opening half of Shukla Pratipada. The last three half-tithis of the month, running into the new Moon, are taken by Shakuni, Chatushpada and Naga in that order. That leaves the 56 slots in between, which the seven movable karanas fill by repeating eight times each. Seven times eight is 56, plus four fixed, and the total is exactly 60. So the count is forced rather than chosen. Nothing about it is a convention that could have gone another way. ## Vishti, the one called Bhadra One of the seven movable karanas is treated very differently from its six siblings. Vishti, also known as Bhadra, is the karana traditionally avoided for anything you want to succeed, and it is the reason most people ever look at this limb at all. Because Vishti is movable, it comes round eight times in every lunar month, the same as Bava or Garaja. That is roughly once every three and a half days, and it lasts about half a tithi, averaging 11 hours 47 minutes across 2026 with a range of 10 hours 02 minutes to 13 hours 22 minutes. Twice a week, for half a day at a time, is a lot more often than the reputation suggests. Which is worth saying plainly: Bhadra is not a rare calamity, it is a regular feature of the calendar, and treating it as an absolute bar would rule out about a seventh of all available time. The name Bhadra is also doing triple duty in this system and it is worth knowing, because it causes real confusion. Bhadra is this karana. Bhadra is also one of the five tithi classes, covering the 2nd, 7th and 12th of each fortnight, which is a favourable designation. And Bhadra is one of the five Panch Mahapurusha yogas, formed by Mercury in a kendra in its own or exaltation sign, which is a matter for [Mercury in different houses](https://mahadasha.com/mercury-in-different-houses) and has nothing to do with half-tithis. Three unrelated things, one word, and only the context separates them. ## The limb that turns over twice a day A karana is half a tithi in degrees, so it is half a tithi in time too. At an average of 11 hours 47 minutes it is the only limb that reliably changes twice within a single panchang day, which has a practical consequence. The karana a calendar prints is the one running at sunrise. Its partner, the second half of the same tithi, will take over sometime during the day and is not usually printed at all. If you are checking whether Vishti falls in your window, the name at sunrise answers only half the question. You need the end time and then the karana that follows. On 5 August 2026 at Delhi that is exactly what happened. The karana at sunrise was Vishti, ending at 09:26:59. So Bhadra was running for the first three and a half hours after sunrise and cleared before mid-morning, and the rest of the day belonged to the next karana in the cycle. Somebody reading only the sunrise value would have written the whole day off. Finding the partner takes no calculation once you know the order. The movable seven always run Bava, Balava, Kaulava, Taitila, Garaja, Vanija, Vishti and back to Bava, so whatever is showing at sunrise, the next one is simply the next name along. Vishti at sunrise means Bava for the rest of the day. Garaja at sunrise means Vanija is coming, and Vishti after that. This is the single most useful habit to build with the karana. Look at the sunrise name, look at its end time, take the next name in the cycle, and you have the whole day rather than half of it. It also lets you see a Bhadra window arriving before the calendar admits it, because a Vanija sunrise means Vishti takes over that same afternoon and no printed almanac will have mentioned it. ## Why the fixed four sit where they do The placement of the four fixed karanas is not decoration either. Three of them occupy the last three half-tithis of the lunar month, running up to the new Moon, and the fourth takes the first half-tithi after it. So they form a block straddling the month boundary: Shakuni, Chatushpada and Naga close the old month, Kimstughna opens the new one. That is four consecutive half-tithis, about two days, in which the ordinary seven-fold cycle is suspended. Then the movable karanas resume and run uninterrupted for the remaining 56 slots. It gives the lunar month a shape a tithi list does not show. The tithis simply count from 1 to 30 and start again. The karanas mark the seam, and the fact that the repeating cycle divides the remainder exactly is what lets it start each month in the same place rather than drifting round. Bava always follows Kimstughna, in every month, because 56 is divisible by 7. ## What each karana in panchang signifies Traditional practice attaches an activity type to each, and unlike some correspondences these are fairly concrete: - **Bava** favours beginnings and anything that should endure. - **Balava** suits study, ritual and priestly work. - **Kaulava** is associated with friendship and alliance, including marriage. - **Taitila** favours trade and the sort of dealing that needs goodwill on both sides. - **Garaja** belongs to agriculture, building and work that goes into the ground. - **Vanija** is the merchant's karana, for buying and selling. - **Vishti** is the one to avoid. The four fixed karanas are used mainly for rites concerning ancestors and for the specific observances attached to the month's boundary, which is where they sit. Shakuni takes its name from a bird, Chatushpada from a four-footed animal and Naga from the serpent, and all three cluster in the closing hours of the dark fortnight when the Moon has almost vanished. Kimstughna, alone on the other side of the new Moon, is the one of the four treated as favourable, which fits its position at the start of something rather than the end. ## How much weight to give it Less than the tithi, more than the yoga, and mostly in one direction. In practice the karana is consulted to check whether Vishti is running, and the other ten rarely change a decision on their own. That is a defensible way to use it, provided you remember the frequency: eight times a month, about half a day each time, so a Bhadra window is something to schedule around rather than an omen. Read it with the tithi it halves, covered in [tithi in panchang](https://mahadasha.com/tithi-in-panchang) , and with the day's other windows in [auspicious and inauspicious days](https://mahadasha.com/auspicious-and-inauspicious-days) . ## Frequently asked questions ### What is karana in panchang? Half a tithi: 6° of separation between Moon and Sun. Sixty of them make a lunar month, filled by seven movable karanas repeating eight times each and four fixed ones appearing once. ### How often does Vishti or Bhadra occur? Eight times per lunar month, since it is one of the seven movable karanas. Each occurrence averages about 11 hours 47 minutes, so it accounts for roughly a seventh of all time. ### Why eleven karanas rather than fifteen or thirty? Because 60 half-tithis split into 4 fixed slots and 56 repeating ones, and 56 divides evenly by 7. Any other count of movable karanas would leave a remainder, so the cycle would not close at the month boundary. ### Why does my calendar show only one karana? It is showing the one running at sunrise. A karana lasts under twelve hours on average, so a second one always takes over during the day, and most printed calendars omit it. The [panchang calculator](https://mahadasha.com/panchang-calculator) gives the karana with its end time, so you can see when the next one begins. For the limb it divides, see [tithi in panchang](https://mahadasha.com/tithi-in-panchang) , and for the whole set, [what is panchang](https://mahadasha.com/what-is-panchang) .