How do you find the Samdharmi of Rahu or Ketu using the KAS Program?
For this visual, I will use my own chart to explain the process. My natal Rahu lies in the 3rd house of Aries in my chart (as seen in both Southern and Northern chart formats below):
How do you find the Samdharmi of Rahu or Ketu using the KAS Program?
For this visual, I will use my own chart to explain the process. My natal Rahu lies in the 3rd house of Aries in my chart (as seen in both Southern and Northern chart formats below):
Samdharmi rule for Rahu and Ketu: Rahu and Ketu are both Samdharmi to the lord of the sign and the lord of the nakshatra they are placed in.
PLEASE NOTE: Conjoining planets to either Rahu and/or Ketu in the same house are ignored when looking for Samdharmi planets in the Rasi! ONLY the above rule applies in these instances. However, Rahu and Ketu are Samdharmi to the sign lord of the Navamsa and any planets they might be conjoined with there.
In my chart, Rahu is in the house of Aries, which is ruled by Mars, so Mars becomes the first Samdharmi planet to act for Rahu.
Next we look to the Natal chart data below to find out which nakshatra Rahu resides in. You can see below that it lies in the Nakshatra of Ketu (in yellow). Since we can't have Ketu as a Samdharmi planet for Rahu, we have to go one step further than normal and find the house that Ketu resides in. From the natal chart you can see that it's in the 9th house, Libra, which is ruled by Venus. Venus now becomes the first Samdharmi planet for Ketu. Then we look at the natal data chart below to see what nakshatra Ketu is in. We can see that it lies in the nakshatra of Mars. (this is highlighted in green).
So we now know that Rahu has Mars for its first Samdharmi, while Ketu in the 9th house has Venus for its Samdharmi and again Mars for its nakshatra lord. So this brings it down to two different planets, Venus and Mars as Samdharmi planets for Rahu. So which one is the strongest?
In order to find out, we go to the Summary page of the KAS program and look at the very top table called the SAV chart. We then check out the 3rd house (where Rahu resides in the natal chart) and see that Mars (the 3rd house ruler) has 5 points. Ketu on the other hand, resides in the 9th house, so we then have to check both Venus (the 9th house ruler) and Mars (nakshatra ruler for Ketu) for the points there. We notice that Venus has 6 points and the 9th house Mars has only 2 points, as circled below. You can easily see that Venus is stronger than both of these Mars planets and therefore becomes the final Samdharmi planet for Rahu.
On the other hand, if Rahu had had Mars for its first Samdharmi planet but had a second planet like Venus for instance, instead of Ketu for its Nakshatra lord planet, then it would've been a simple matter to look up both Mars and Venus points for the 3rd house alone in the SAV chart. In this case, Mars (the 3rd house ruler) would've wound up as Rahu's Samdharmi planet with 5 points as compared to Venus (the nakshatra lord for the 3rd house) with only 4 points, as shown below.
QUESTION: What if in the SAV chart below, both Mars and Venus had an equal amount of points? Then what would we do? What would be the next step?
ANSWER: In such a case, when choosing between the sign lord and the nakshatra lord and both planets have exactly the same amount of points, the sign lord takes precedence and becomes the Samdharmi planet for Rahu. For example, in the chart below, if both Mars and Venus had exactly the same amount of points, then because Mars is the natural sign lord for Rahu in this case, it would become the Samdharmi planet for Rahu instead of Venus.