Indira Gandhi was born on 19 November 1917 in Allahabad (now Prayagraj) at 11:11 pm, the time her private secretary recorded. Her kundli has a Cancer (Karka) ascendant at 27°21′, a Capricorn (Makara) Moon sign and Uttara Ashadha nakshatra, pada 3. She became Prime Minister in her 16-year Jupiter mahadasha (1954 to 1970); her largest election win, her 1977 defeat and her 1980 return all came in the Saturn mahadasha that followed. She died in New Delhi on 31 October 1984.
Indira Gandhi's birth details
| Date of birth | 19 November 1917, Monday |
|---|---|
| Time of birth | 11:11 pm, India time (her private secretary's record: 41 ghatis, 52 palas and 23 vipalas after sunrise, which is 11:11:14 pm) |
| Place of birth | Allahabad (now Prayagraj), Uttar Pradesh, India (25.4448 N, 81.8432 E) |
| Rising sign (Lagna) | Cancer (Karka), 27°21′ |
| Moon sign (Rashi) | Capricorn (Makara) |
| Birth star (Nakshatra) | Uttara Ashadha, pada 3 |
| Moon day (Tithi) | Shukla Shashthi, the 6th day of the waxing Moon |
| Main period at birth (Mahadasha) | Sun (Surya), until 15 November 1919 |
| Died | 31 October 1984, New Delhi |
Indira Gandhi's kundli (birth chart)
North Indian style. Numbers are the signs (1 Aries to 12 Pisces); the top diamond is her rising sign. R means retrograde. Coloured planets are explained below.
Her important planets
- Saturn: On her rising sign, in Cancer. Duty, discipline and a serious face; tests that make her stronger. It rules her houses of partners (the 7th) and of sudden change (the 8th).
- Moon: Ruler of her chart, in the 7th house (Capricorn), the house of the public and of partners. Her mind turned outward, to the people. The Moon and Saturn have swapped homes.
- Mars: Rules her houses of career (the 10th) and of intelligence (the 5th), the best planet for a Cancer rising sign. In Leo, in the 2nd house of speech and family: a commanding voice.
- Sun: The planet of government and authority, in the 5th house of judgement and power, with Mercury. The Sun and Mars have swapped homes.
- Jupiter: Her planet of luck (it rules the 9th), in the 11th house of gains (Taurus), retrograde. It looks at the Moon and at the Sun. Jupiter and Venus have swapped homes.
What her chart says, in plain words
Cancer rising is the sign of the protector. People born with it guard their own fiercely, remember everything and feel deeply, even when they look calm.
Saturn sitting on that rising sign changes the picture. It gives a serious, self-reliant manner, a sense of duty from an early age, and the patience to wait for one's moment. Astrologers say Saturn here makes a person carry heavy loads, and grow strong by carrying them.
The Moon, ruler of her chart, sits opposite, in the 7th house of the public and of partners, so her own life and public life were tied together. The Moon and Saturn have also swapped homes (each sits in the other's sign), a strong link that our engine counts as a royal combination (Raja yoga).
Her chart has two more swaps. The Sun and Mars link her house of speech and family with her house of intelligence and power; our engine reads this as a wealth combination (Dhana yoga). Jupiter and Venus link her house of contests with her house of gains; classical texts call a swap with the 6th house a "Dainya" exchange, read as gains that come only after a struggle.
Mars rules both her career house and her house of intelligence, which makes it the best planet for a Cancer rising sign. It sits in the Sun's sign, Leo, in her house of speech: a voice that commands.
Jupiter, her planet of luck, sits in the house of gains and looks at the Moon, and at the Sun and Mercury. In plain words: goodwill and good fortune kept reaching both her public life and her judgement.
Want the same reading for yourself? Make your own free kundli and check your mahadasha dates. More on her main placements: Cancer ascendant, the Moon in Capricorn, Uttara Ashadha nakshatra, Saturn in the 1st house, the Moon in the 7th house, the Jupiter mahadasha and the Saturn mahadasha.
What is Indira Gandhi's birth time?
Her private secretary wrote it the traditional way: 41 ghatis, 52 palas and 23 vipalas after sunrise, which is 11:11:14 pm India time (quoted by the astrologer Robert Jansky on Astro-Databank, which rates it A). A ghati is 24 minutes. Counted from that morning's sunrise at Prayagraj by the classical rule, the centre of the Sun on the horizon (6:26 am), our engine gets 11:11:15 pm: one second from the secretary's own figure. So the record holds together.
Two other times circulate. 11:39 pm, given by B. V. Raman and others, would make her rising sign Leo at 3°31′ instead of Cancer: her planets would stay in the same signs but fall in other houses. Her biographer Katherine Frank writes that the birth was announced at "around 11 pm", which fits 11:11 pm. A French source, Cahiers Astrologiques, gives 3:40 pm, against every Indian source.
We also tested the times against 12 dated events of her life (details below). The events cannot choose between them, so this page uses the most exact record: 11:11 pm. The Moon sign, Capricorn, and the nakshatra, Uttara Ashadha pada 3, are the same for every night-time version.
What happened when, and why
Astrology splits a life into long phases, each ruled by one planet, with shorter phases inside. Below, each public moment of her life is matched with the phase her chart was in. This is how astrology reads it, not proof, and it takes no side in her politics.
1917 to 1936: a childhood inside the freedom movement
Sun, Moon and Mars periods
- 19 Nov 1917Born at Anand Bhavan in Allahabad, the daughter of Jawaharlal and Kamala Nehru.Why then: The Sun's period was running at her birth, and the Sun, the planet of government, sits in her house of power and judgement (the 5th). The home she was born into was a centre of India's freedom movement.
1936 to 1954: study, marriage, motherhood and Independence
Rahu period, Nov 1936 to Nov 1954
Rahu sits in her 6th house, the house of contests and service. Its 18 years took her abroad to study, into marriage and motherhood, and then into public duty beside her father.
- 1937Joins Somerville College, Oxford, to study history.Why then: Rahu, the planet of foreign lands, was running its own first sub-period.
- 26 Mar 1942Marries Feroze Gandhi in Allahabad.Why then: Saturn rules her 7th house, the house of marriage, and Saturn ran both her sub-period and the shorter period inside it. That spring, Jupiter and Saturn in the sky both touched her house of marriage or its ruler: the "double transit" astrologers look for.
- 20 Aug 1944Her first son, Rajiv, is born in Bombay.Why then: Jupiter, the planet of children, ran the shortest period, and in the sky Jupiter sat right on Mars, the ruler of her house of children.
- 14 Dec 1946Her second son, Sanjay, is born in Delhi.Why then: Mercury, which sits in her house of children, ran the sub-period, with Jupiter again running the shortest period inside it.
- Aug 1947India becomes independent. Her father becomes Prime Minister, and she runs his household and travels with him.Why then: In the sky, Saturn came back to the exact place it held at her birth on 25 August 1947, ten days after Independence. Astrologers call this the Saturn return: the end of youth and the start of adult duty.
1954 to 1970: the steady rise
Jupiter period, Nov 1954 to Nov 1970
Jupiter is her planet of luck (it rules her 9th house) and sits in her house of gains. Its 16 years carried her from her father's side to the top job.
- Feb 1959Becomes President of the Indian National Congress.Why then: Saturn sub-period. Saturn sits on her rising sign: responsibility given to her personally. These were also the years of Saturn's seven-and-a-half-year passage over her Moon (Sade Sati, Feb 1958 to Dec 1966), which here brought weight and duty, not loss.
- 9 Jun 1964Becomes Minister of Information and Broadcasting in Lal Bahadur Shastri's government.Why then: The strongest match of her whole life by our scoring: Jupiter and Venus (the ruler of her house of gains) ran the periods, and Jupiter and Saturn in the sky both touched her career house.
- 24 Jan 1966Sworn in as Prime Minister, the first woman to hold the office in India.Why then: Sun sub-period. The Sun is the planet of government and authority, and it sits in her house of power.
- 13 Mar 1967Wins the general election and forms her second government.Why then: Moon sub-period. The Moon rules her chart and sits in her house of the public: her first win in a national vote came in it.
- 1969The Congress party splits, and she leads the larger part.Why then: Rahu sub-period, from Jun 1968. Rahu sits in her house of rivals and contests; classically, Rahu there wins fights.
1970 to 1984: the peak and the hardest tests
Saturn period, from Nov 1970
Saturn sits on her rising sign and rules her houses of partners (the 7th) and of sudden change (the 8th). Its period brought both her greatest power and her sharpest fall.
- 18 Mar 1971A landslide win in the general election; her third government.Why then: Saturn's own sub-period had just begun: the planet on her rising sign put her at the centre of everything.
- 16 Dec 1971India wins the war, and Bangladesh is born.Why then: Still Saturn's own sub-period.
- 18 May 1974India's first nuclear test, at Pokhran.Why then: Mercury sub-period. That month Jupiter and Saturn in the sky both touched Mars, the ruler of her career house.
- 25 Jun 1975A national Emergency is declared. It lasts until March 1977.Why then: We do not score this as good or bad: that is a question of politics, not of the chart. It fell in her Mercury sub-period.
- 24 Mar 1977Loses the general election and leaves office.Why then: Ketu sub-period, from Jul 1976. Ketu sits in her 12th house, the house of loss and withdrawal. And from Oct 1976 to Jul 1977, Saturn in the sky crossed back and forth over the place it held at her birth, on her rising sign: her second Saturn return.
- 14 Jan 1980Returns as Prime Minister after the general election.Why then: Venus sub-period, from Sep 1977. Venus rules her house of gains.
- 31 Oct 1984Her life ended in Delhi.Why then: We do not read death from a birth chart, so her story stops here.
Her life in six main periods
- Sun, 1917 to 1919: born into politics
- Moon, 1919 to 1929: childhood
- Mars, 1929 to 1936: school years
- Rahu, 1936 to 1954: study, marriage, sons, Independence
- Jupiter, 1954 to 1970: the steady rise to the top job
- Saturn, 1970 to 1984: the peak and the hardest tests
Questions people ask
When and where was Indira Gandhi born?
Indira Gandhi was born on Monday, 19 November 1917, at 11:11 pm in Allahabad (now Prayagraj), Uttar Pradesh. She died in New Delhi on 31 October 1984, so her death anniversary falls on 31 October.
What is Indira Gandhi's birth time?
11:11 pm. Her private secretary gave it as 41 ghatis, 52 palas and 23 vipalas after sunrise, which is 11:11:14 pm; counted from that day's sunrise at Prayagraj by the classical rule, our engine gets 11:11:15 pm. Other times in circulation are 11:39 pm (given by B. V. Raman) and "around 11 pm" (her biographer Katherine Frank).
What was Indira Gandhi's rashi (Moon sign)?
Capricorn (Makara). The Moon was at 5°35′ Capricorn at 11:11 pm, and it stays in Capricorn for every published night-time birth time, from 11:00 pm to 11:39 pm.
What was Indira Gandhi's birth star (nakshatra)?
Uttara Ashadha, pada 3. The Moon at 5°35′ Capricorn falls in the third quarter of Uttara Ashadha (3°20′ to 6°40′ Capricorn), and every night-time version of her birth time gives the same pada. Its lord, the Sun, ran her first main period, which ended on 15 November 1919.
What was Indira Gandhi's ascendant (lagna)?
Cancer (Karka), at 27°21′, with the 11:11 pm time, and Saturn sits on it at 21°47′ Cancer. The 11:39 pm version gives Leo at 3°31′, so the rising sign depends on which record is used. Her navamsa (D9) ascendant at 11:11 pm is Pisces.
Which zodiac sign was Indira Gandhi?
In Western (tropical) astrology her Sun sign is Scorpio. In Vedic (sidereal) astrology her Sun is also in Scorpio (4°07′), her Moon sign is Capricorn and her rising sign is Cancer.
Which yogas are in Indira Gandhi's horoscope?
Our free kundli tests 24 classical combinations and finds 9 in her chart: Raja yoga, Dhana yoga, Parivartana yoga (three sign exchanges), Anapha, Veshi, Vasumati, Nabhasa Dama, benefics guarding the lagna, and Budhaditya in part. The most notable are her three sign exchanges: the Moon with Saturn, the Sun with Mars, and Jupiter with Venus. The Moon and Saturn link is read as a Raja yoga and the Sun and Mars exchange as a Dhana yoga.
Which mahadasha was Indira Gandhi running when she became Prime Minister?
The Jupiter mahadasha (14 November 1954 to 14 November 1970), in its Sun sub-period, when she was sworn in on 24 January 1966. Her 1971 election win came early in the Saturn mahadasha, which began on 14 November 1970.
For astrologers: the full working
Tap a heading to open it.
The birth time, checked
A ghati is 24 minutes, a pala 24 seconds and a vipala 0.4 seconds, so 41 ghatis, 52 palas and 23 vipalas come to 16 hours, 44 minutes and 57 seconds after sunrise. Sunrise depends on the rule used. With the classical rule (the centre of the Sun on the horizon, no allowance for refraction), the secretary's figure is matched to within a second:
| Sunrise rule | Sunrise at Prayagraj, 19 Nov 1917 | Birth time it gives |
|---|---|---|
| Centre of the Sun on the horizon, no refraction (the classical rule) | 06:26:17 | 23:11:15 |
| Upper edge of the Sun, with refraction (the modern rule) | 06:22:21 | 23:07:18 |
All published versions, with the rising sign each one gives in our engine:
| Time | Rating | Source | Rising sign |
|---|---|---|---|
| 23:11 | A (Astro-Databank) | Robert Jansky quotes her private secretary: "41 Ghatis 52 Phals and 23 Viphas = 11:11:14 PM IST". Ghatis are counted from sunrise; with the classical sunrise (centre of the Sun on the horizon, no refraction) at Prayagraj that day, 06:26:17 IST, our engine turns the ghatis into 11:11:15 pm, one second from the secretary's own figure. | Cancer 27d 21m 55s |
| 23:39 | second version | Zip Dobyns obtained 11:39 PM while in India; Astro-Databank notes the same time was given by B. V. Raman in an Indian astrology magazine. | Leo 3d 31m 33s |
| 23:00 | approximate | Katherine Frank, Indira: The Life of Indira Nehru Gandhi (Houghton Mifflin, 2002): her grandmother came out of the room to announce the birth at "around 11 PM" (quoted by Sy Scholfield on Astro-Databank). | Cancer 24d 57m 24s |
| 15:40 | doubtful | Cahiers Astrologiques 122, p. 131, gives 3:40 PM (cited on Astro-Databank). Every Indian source and her biographer place the birth at night. | Aries 7d 05m 18s |
Every event, scored
Each event has a kind, and each kind a set of houses: career rise 10 and 11; career fall 8 and 12; marriage 2, 7 and 11; child 2, 5 and 11. A period lord "signifies" a house if it sits in it or rules it. Score per event: main period 1 point, sub-period 2, the shorter period 1 (most 4). Double transit: 1 point when Jupiter and Saturn in the sky both touch the key house or its ruler. This is the same rule as on our Shah Rukh Khan page, fixed before any result was seen.
| Date | Event | Kind | Periods (main / sub / shorter) | Score (of 4) | Double transit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26 Mar 1942 | Marries Feroze Gandhi in Allahabad | marriage | Rahu / Saturn / Saturn | 3 | 1 |
| 20 Aug 1944 | First son, Rajiv, born in Bombay | child | Rahu / Saturn / Jupiter | 1 | 1 |
| 14 Dec 1946 | Second son, Sanjay, born in Delhi | child | Rahu / Mercury / Jupiter | 3 | 0 |
| Feb 1959 | Becomes President of the Indian National Congress (February 1959) | career rise | Jupiter / Saturn / Rahu | 1 | 0 |
| 9 Jun 1964 | Union Minister of Information and Broadcasting in Shastri's government | career rise | Jupiter / Venus / Jupiter | 4 | 1 |
| 24 Jan 1966 | Sworn in as Prime Minister of India for the first time | career rise | Jupiter / Sun / Ketu | 1 | 0 |
| 13 Mar 1967 | Wins the 1967 general election and forms her second government | career rise | Jupiter / Moon / Ketu | 1 | 0 |
| 18 Mar 1971 | Landslide win in the 1971 election; third government formed | career rise | Saturn / Saturn / Saturn | 0 | 0 |
| 16 Dec 1971 | India wins the 1971 war; Bangladesh is born | career rise | Saturn / Saturn / Venus | 1 | 0 |
| 18 May 1974 | India's first nuclear test at Pokhran (Smiling Buddha) | career rise | Saturn / Mercury / Ketu | 0 | 1 |
| 24 Mar 1977 | Loses the 1977 election and leaves office | career fall | Saturn / Ketu / Jupiter | 3 | 0 |
| 14 Jan 1980 | Returns as Prime Minister after the 1980 election | career rise | Saturn / Venus / Saturn | 2 | 0 |
Did the events pick the birth time?
No. We scored every 7th day from 1940 to 1984 the same way, to see what a random date would score. A z-score near 0 means "no better than chance"; about +2 would start to mean something.
| Birth time | Rising sign | Dasha points (actual / chance) | z | Double transits (actual / chance) | z |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23:11 | Cancer 27.4° | 20 / 19.75 | +0.06 | 4 / 3.41 | +0.38 |
| 23:39 | Leo 3.5° | 25 / 24.09 | +0.22 | 3 / 4.8 | -1.06 |
| 23:00 | Cancer 25.0° | 19 / 19.78 | -0.19 | 4 / 3.41 | +0.38 |
| 15:40 | Aries 7.1° | 16 / 17.41 | -0.35 | 3 / 3.43 | -0.28 |
Over the whole day (every 8 minutes), the best-scoring time is 06:40 (Scorpio rising), a peak of about the size chance gives when 180 times are tried. So the events cannot choose between the published times; we keep 11:11 pm because its record is the most exact and its arithmetic checks out.
| Rising sign | Birth times | Dasha z | Transit z |
|---|---|---|---|
| Leo | 00:00 to 23:52 | -0.03 to +2.32 | -1.06 |
| Virgo | 01:44 to 03:52 | -1.55 to +0.79 | +1.31 |
| Libra | 04:00 to 06:08 | -1.31 to +0.91 | -0.46 |
| Scorpio | 06:16 to 08:24 | +0.27 to +1.63 | +1.23 |
| Sagittarius | 08:32 to 10:32 | -0.40 to +0.36 | +2.30 |
| Capricorn | 10:40 to 12:16 | -1.71 to -0.46 | -1.20 |
| Aquarius | 12:24 to 13:44 | -1.01 to +0.77 | +1.89 |
| Pisces | 13:52 to 15:12 | +0.09 to +1.67 | -0.84 |
| Aries | 15:20 to 16:48 | -0.65 to -0.14 | -0.28 |
| Taurus | 16:56 to 18:48 | +0.07 to +0.34 | -0.81 |
| Gemini | 18:56 to 21:04 | -1.04 to -0.04 | +0.83 |
| Cancer | 21:12 to 23:20 | -0.47 to +0.25 | +0.38 |
How our period grades were tested, including on her life
On our Shah Rukh Khan page, future periods were first graded by an earlier rule (the sub-period planet's nature for the rising sign, plus Jupiter and Saturn in the sky). Run without changes over Indira Gandhi's public life from 1954 to 1984, it fitted only 1 of her 9 turning points and was clearly wrong on 5. We no longer use it.
The rule now used on our celebrity pages grades a period by the planets that run the main period and the sub-period, judged for the rising sign. Before using it, we tested it on 212 dated public events (126 highs and 86 lows) from 24 people with reliable birth times, and she is one of them. Across all 24 it scored highs above lows more often than chance: 0.62, where a coin toss scores 0.5 and a perfect rule 1.0.
On her own 9 highs and 3 lows it scored 0.54, close to chance: of the 27 ways to pair one of her highs with one of her lows, it put the high above the low 9 times, the low above the high 7 times, and could not tell them apart 11 times. Read any period grade as a broad tendency, never as a forecast you can rely on.
Combinations (yogas) our free kundli tool finds
Read from our live tool for 19 Nov 1917, 11:11 pm, Prayagraj: 24 classical combinations tested, 9 formed (one of them partly). A yoga is a tendency, not a promise.
- Raja Yoga: Kendra-Trikona Raja Yoga: Saturn and Moon in mutual aspect.
- Dhana Yoga: Sign exchange: Sun (lord of the 2nd) and Mars (lord of the 5th).
- Parivartana Yoga: Maha: Moon (1st lord) and Saturn (7th lord); Maha: Sun (2nd lord) and Mars (5th lord); Dainya: Jupiter (6th lord) and Venus (11th lord).
- Anapha Yoga: Venus in the 12th from the Moon.
- Veshi Yoga: Venus in the 2nd from the Sun.
- Vasumati Yoga: Jupiter (11th) and Venus (6th) in growth houses.
- Nabhasa: Dama Yoga: The seven classical planets occupy 6 different signs.
- Benefics guarding the Lagna: Moon (7th).
- Budhaditya Yoga (partly): The Sun and Mercury together in Scorpio (5th house).
What we left out, and why
- Deaths in her family (her husband in 1960, her son Sanjay in 1980) and her own death in 1984: our rule is that we do not read illness or death from a chart.
- Court cases and arrests (the 1975 Allahabad High Court verdict, her 1977 arrest and her expulsion from the Lok Sabha): our rule leaves out legal matters.
- Events whose good or bad depends on one's politics (the Emergency of 1975 to 1977, the 1969 split of the Congress, Operation Blue Star): they are mentioned in the story as facts, but not scored as good or bad.
- Her imprisonment during the Quit India movement (arrested in September 1942, released in April 1943): a political imprisonment, left out of the scoring with the other legal matters.
Full planet table (11:11 pm) and the two possible charts
| Planet | Sign | Degree | Nakshatra, pada | House |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rising sign | Cancer | 27°21′ | Ashlesha 4 | 1 |
| Sun | Scorpio | 4°07′ | Anuradha 1 | 5 |
| Moon | Capricorn | 5°35′ | Uttara Ashadha 3 | 7 |
| Mars | Leo | 16°22′ | Purva Phalguni 1 | 2 |
| Mercury | Scorpio | 13°13′ | Anuradha 3 | 5 |
| Jupiter (retrograde) | Taurus | 15°00′ | Rohini 2 | 11 |
| Venus | Sagittarius | 21°00′ | Purva Ashadha 3 | 6 |
| Saturn | Cancer | 21°47′ | Ashlesha 2 | 1 |
| Rahu | Sagittarius | 10°33′ | Mula 4 | 6 |
| Ketu | Gemini | 10°33′ | Ardra 2 | 12 |
Degrees, nakshatras and houses as our free planet position calculator shows them (sidereal, Lahiri, whole sign houses), checked against it on 2 Nov 2026. Navamsa (D9) ascendant: Pisces. Mangal dosha: present but cancelled (Mars in Leo), and Kaal Sarp: not present, as our free kundli shows.
11:11 pm: Cancer rising
11:39 pm: Leo rising
Sources
- Birth time, its ghati record and every other version (Astro-Databank, rating A): astro.com
- Her life, education, family and offices (Wikipedia): en.wikipedia.org
- 20 Aug 1944: First son, Rajiv, born in Bombay: en.wikipedia.org
- 20 Aug 1944: First son, Rajiv, born in Bombay: astro.com
- 14 Dec 1946: Second son, Sanjay, born in Delhi: en.wikipedia.org
- 14 Dec 1946: Second son, Sanjay, born in Delhi: astro.com
- Feb 1959: Becomes President of the Indian National Congress (February 1959): csmonitor.com
- Feb 1959: Becomes President of the Indian National Congress (February 1959): en.wikipedia.org
- 13 Mar 1967: Wins the 1967 general election and forms her second government: en.wikipedia.org
- 18 Mar 1971: Landslide win in the 1971 election; third government formed: en.wikipedia.org
- 16 Dec 1971: India wins the 1971 war; Bangladesh is born: en.wikipedia.org
- 18 May 1974: India's first nuclear test at Pokhran (Smiling Buddha): en.wikipedia.org
- 24 Mar 1977: Loses the 1977 election and leaves office: en.wikipedia.org
- 24 Mar 1977: Loses the 1977 election and leaves office: en.wikipedia.org
- 14 Jan 1980: Returns as Prime Minister after the 1980 election: en.wikipedia.org
This page is an astrological study of a historical figure, written for education and interest. It is not linked to, approved or endorsed by her family or by any political party, and it takes no side in politics. It uses only public, sourced facts and reads no illness or death from the chart. Chart positions come from our own engine; how we check our numbers.