Thirty-six points, and what they actually weigh, the gist

Thirty-six points, and what they actually weigh

The marriage compatibility score families quote is out of thirty-six because its eight parts are worth one to eight points, and two of those parts are on-off switches that can overrule the total by themselves.

This is the short way in. The essay has the working, the sources and the sky.

Add the numbers one to eight and you get thirty-six. That is the whole origin of the number. Nobody measured eight things and found that one of them counted eight times as much as another. Somebody put eight things in order of importance and then used each thing's place in the queue as its score.

Before many Indian marriages, the two families have the boy's and the girl's birth details compared. The system used has eight headings and produces a score out of thirty-six. Nikhil Verma takes it apart.

Each heading is worth a fixed number of points: the first one, the second two, on to the eighth, worth eight. That is why the total is thirty-six.

Two things matter more than any single heading. First, all eight come from one thing: where the moon stood when each person was born. Nothing else in either chart is used. Second, that position is rounded off twice: to a birth star (one of twenty-seven slices of the sky) and to a moon sign (one of twelve). So each person arrives as one of thirty-six possible states. Everything else about them is left outside.

Bhakoot is worth seven and nadi is worth eight, and neither is graded: each is full marks or nothing. That is fifteen of the thirty-six points sitting in two switches.

The switches are not rare. Nadi sorts twenty-seven stars into three groups of nine, so about one couple in three lands in the same group and scores nothing. Bhakoot fails on six of the twelve possible gaps between the two moon signs. Verma will not multiply the two fractions together, since both come from the same moon.

A couple that fails both switches can still score twenty-one, inside the band the tables call very good. Yet the same tables say a failed nadi makes even twenty-eight unacceptable. The people who publish them are admitting in public that the total is not what decides. The switches are.

So what is the number for? It travels. A judgement needs the person who made it in the room. A number fits in a message, can be repeated by anyone, and can be set beside the next candidate's score. It also refuses on a family's behalf without anyone giving a reason. And it is free: every large matrimonial site computes it instantly. The paid work sits on the other side, in the failed switch.

Words decoded

birth chart: a map of where the sun, moon and planets stood at your exact time and place of birth
moon sign (rashi, राशि): which of the twelve signs the moon was in when you were born
birth star (nakshatra, नक्षत्र): which of twenty-seven equal slices of the moon's path it was in; a finer measure than the sign
ashtakoota (अष्टकूट): "eight headings", the system used to compare two people; running it is called guna milan
guna (गुण): here simply a point, one of the thirty-six
nadi (नाडी): the heaviest heading, worth eight points; it sorts the twenty-seven stars into three groups of nine and gives nothing if both people fall in the same group
bhakoot (भकूट): the second heaviest, worth seven; it measures the distance between the two moon signs, and certain distances score nothing
porutham: the southern equivalent, a list of ten items judged one at a time rather than added into a total

Why anyone should careA number can decide whether two people are ever introduced, and that number is made from two rounded-off moon positions and nothing else. If one is handed to you, ask for the eight line items rather than the total, and ask what the person quoting it would have you do differently if it were four points higher.

Read it properly, 8 min Thirty-six points, and what they actually weigh