---
type: Concept
bundle: jyotisha-kala
bundle_version: 0.12.0
id: karana
title: Karaṇa
iast: Karaṇa
devanagari: करण
description: 'The half-tithi: eleven karaṇas, seven movable repeating eight times each and four fixed standing once each per lunar month; NOT half a solar day, NOT a redundant subdivision, NOT an omen in isolation.'
darshana:
- Jyotiṣa
text_source: Sūrya Siddhānta 2.67-69; Muhūrta Cintāmaṇi
tags:
- karana
- panchanga
- calendrics
- tithi
- jyotisha
not:
- term: 'half a solar day'
  why: 'A karaṇa is half a TITHI, the angular unit, so its clock length varies exactly as the tithi’s does. Splitting the civil day misplaces every karaṇa boundary.'
  instead: 'Render karaṇa as half-tithi and keep the Sanskrit term.'
- term: 'a redundant subdivision'
  why: 'Election turns on it: Viṣṭi (Bhadrā), the seventh movable karaṇa, is the standing exclusion across the muhūrta literature, avoided for new undertakings. The limb does independent work in the almanac.'
- term: 'an omen in isolation'
  why: 'Like the other limbs, the karaṇa is a computed quantity with codified electional uses. Read alone as a portent it loses the system that gives it meaning.'
related:
- /concepts/tithi.md
- /concepts/panchanga.md
- /concepts/muhurta.md
timestamp: '2026-07-09'
okf_version: '0.2'
license: CC BY-SA 4.0
---

# Karaṇa -- करण

**Not:** half a solar day, a redundant subdivision, an omen in isolation

## What It Actually Means

A karaṇa is half a tithi: sixty per synodic month. Eleven names cover the sixty: seven movable karaṇas (Bava, Bālava, Kaulava, Taitila, Gara, Vaṇija, Viṣṭi) cycle eight times each, and four fixed ones (Śakuni, Catuṣpada, Nāga, Kiṃstughna) stand once each around the month’s dark end. The scheme matters operationally: Viṣṭi, also called Bhadrā, is the standing exclusion in election, and almanacs flag it daily. The karaṇa is the fifth limb of the pañcāṅga, a computed quantity with rule-governed uses, not a floating omen.

## Audience Metaphor

Half-bricks paving a lunar month: each tithi splits into two karaṇas, seven patterns repeating down the road and four odd-shaped ones set at the month’s dark corner. The election manuals read the paving under a day before letting you build on it, and one brick (Viṣṭi) is marked: do not build here.

## Citations

1. Sūrya Siddhānta 2.67-69 on the karaṇa scheme -- see [references/surya-siddhanta.md](../references/surya-siddhanta.md)
2. Muhūrta Cintāmaṇi on the Viṣṭi exclusion -- see [references/muhurta-chintamani.md](../references/muhurta-chintamani.md)
