Ashtakavarga: the scoring system behind the bindus in your kundli
अष्टकवर्ग
What is Ashtakavarga in Vedic astrology?
Ashtakavarga is a scoring system that gives each house a number, called bindus, by counting classical contributions from the seven planets and the ascendant. It produces a per-planet chart (Bhinnashtakavarga) and a combined one (Sarvashtakavarga), and is used mainly to compare houses within a chart and to judge transits.
Why a numerical system exists at all
Most of Vedic astrology is read qualitatively — this planet rules that house, this one aspects it. Ashtakavarga is the part of the tradition that produces a number instead, and that is the reason it survives: it lets two houses in the same chart be compared without argument.
The number comes from fixed tables. Each contributor casts a bindu onto particular houses counted from its own position, and those tables are the same for everyone. Nothing in the method is interpretive, which is also its limit — the number tells you how many contributions landed, not what will happen.
The fixed total, and what follows from it
Every chart's Sarvashtakavarga sums to 337 across twelve houses. That single fact shapes how the system can honestly be used. It means the scores are a distribution, not a quantity of fortune: a chart cannot score highly everywhere, and a high house always implies a lower one somewhere else.
It also means comparison across people is meaningless. Two charts have the same 337 to spend. Anyone reading your bindus as a measure of how good your chart is, relative to someone else's, is using a number that cannot answer that question.
Where it earns its place
Two uses hold up. First, ranking the houses of one chart: which areas of life carry more support than others, which is useful background to almost any question. Second, judging transits: a slow planet crossing a house where it has many of its own bindus is read as finding support, and the same planet crossing a house where it has few as meeting friction.
The second is why Ashtakavarga appears in Saturn transit and Sade Sati readings, and why our reports compute it. A Sade Sati phase through a well-supported house is a different period from the same phase through a poorly supported one, and the bindus are what tells the two apart.
Common questions
- What does the bindu row on my free kundli mean?
- It is your Sarvashtakavarga: one total per house, starting from the 1st. An average house carries about 28 of a possible 56, and the whole chart always sums to 337.
- Is a higher Ashtakavarga score always better?
- Within one chart, a higher total means the house is better supported. Across charts it means nothing, because every chart distributes the same 337 bindus.
- What is Ashtakavarga mainly used for?
- Comparing houses within one chart, and judging how a transit will go — a planet crossing a house where it has many of its own bindus is read as finding support there.
- Is Ashtakavarga part of the standard birth chart?
- It is computed from the same positions and is standard in a full reading, though it is often left out of short ones. Our free kundli shows the Sarvashtakavarga row, and the Premium Kundli reads both it and the per-planet charts.