Saturn Transit in Punarvasu

Punarvasu belongs to Jupiter, neutral toward Saturn. Its deity is Aditi, mother of the gods, and its symbol is a bow and quiver. Three padas lie in Gemini, a friend's sign, and the fourth in Cancer, the sign of the Moon, whom Saturn counts an enemy.

The name means the return of light, and recovery after loss, homecoming, renewal and the arrow returning to the quiver are its themes. Saturn makes the return slow and earned. What was lost in Ardra is rebuilt piece by piece: a house is repaired, and an estranged relative is spoken to again.

Saturn spends about a year in a nakshatra, and the retrograde usually breaks the stay into two or three visits. The fourth pada, in Cancer, is the hardest part. There Saturn enters the Moon's sign, and the home comes under strain.

• Gemini padas: Sade Sati for Cancer, Gemini and Taurus Moons; Kantaka for Pisces; Ashtama for Scorpio.
• Cancer pada: Sade Sati for Leo, Cancer and Gemini Moons; Kantaka for Aries; Ashtama for Sagittarius.
• Phaladeepika's favourable third, sixth and eleventh: Aries, Capricorn and Leo Moons and lagnas in Gemini, then Taurus, Aquarius and Virgo in Cancer.

The question the stay puts is whether a person can begin again without bitterness. Aditi is the unbounded and Saturn the boundary, and the work between them is patience with a second attempt.

The remedy is the repair of what was neglected: a debt paid, a parent visited, a practice resumed at a fixed hour. Give sesame or oil on Saturday, recite Om Sham Shanaishcharaya Namah, and honour the guru, since Jupiter rules the nakshatra. Feeding mothers and children in Aditi's name suits the last pada.