Reference
The Karanas
A karana is half a tithi — six degrees of the Moon's elongation from the Sun — so there are two in every tithi and sixty in every lunar month. Eleven names fill those sixty slots.
Bava
बवFavours beginnings, worship and travel.
Balava
बालवFavours religious rites, study and priestly work.
Kaulava
कौलवFavours friendship, alliance and marriage.
Taitila
तैतिलFavours trade, negotiation and diplomacy.
Gara
गरFavours agriculture, sowing and building. Neutral for most other work.
Vanija
वणिजFavours commerce, buying and selling.
Vishti
विष्टिThis is Bhadra. All auspicious work stops for its duration — the single most consequential karana on any panchang.
Shakuni
शकुनिFavours medicine and remedial work only; poor for beginnings.
Chatushpada
चतुष्पादFavours cattle, ancestral rites and charity; poor for beginnings.
Naga
नागImmobile and obstructive. Nothing new is begun here.
Kimstughna
किंस्तुघ्नThe first half-tithi of the lunar month. Favours worship and auspicious beginnings.
The one that matters most
Vishti, also called Bhadra
If you take one thing from this page.
Vishti is the seventh movable karana, and it is the single most consequential entry on any panchang. Traditionally all auspicious work — marriage, housewarming, naming, travel, new ventures — stops for its duration, which is roughly half a tithi, or ten to thirteen hours.
Because it is a movable karana it comes round eight times a lunar month, so it is not rare and it is worth checking before fixing anything. Our daily panchang shows the karana with its exact start and end time, so you can see whether a given hour falls inside it.
How the sixty slots fill
Seven movable, four fixed
The first half-tithi of the lunar month is always Kimstughna. The seven movable karanas — Bava, Balava, Kaulava, Taitila, Gara, Vanija, Vishti — then cycle eight times over the next fifty-six slots. The final three belong to Shakuni, Chatushpada and Naga, one each.
That is 1 + 56 + 3 = 60, which is exactly two per tithi across the month. Every tithi boundary is therefore also a karana boundary — a property we assert in our test suite, because two independent calculations landing on the same instant is the strongest check we have that both are right.