Nine padas of the Avakahada chakra fall in Kanya, the moon sign the Western zodiac calls Virgo. They come from Uttara Phalguni, Hasta and Chitra, and between them they give 9 sounds a name may begin with.
Below: every one of those syllables with the nakshatra and pada it belongs to, and the 42 names in our corpus that begin with them — each written in Devanagari and reduced to its Chaldean root number.
One per pada. A pandit reads the pada from the birth chart and hands the family the sound — this is the whole set for the rashi.
A rashi spans 30° and a nakshatra 13°20′, so the two never divide evenly: every rashi is exactly two and a quarter nakshatras.
| Nakshatra | Pada | Syllable | Names in our corpus |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🌞 Uttara Phalguni | 2 | To | 0 |
| 🌞 Uttara Phalguni | 3 | Pa | 12 |
| 🌞 Uttara Phalguni | 4 | Pi | 4 |
| ✋ Hasta | 1 | Pu | 6 |
| ✋ Hasta | 2 | Sha | 11 |
| ✋ Hasta | 3 | Na | 9 |
| ✋ Hasta | 4 | Tha | 0 |
| 💎 Chitra | 1 | Pe | 0 |
| 💎 Chitra | 2 | Po | 0 |
Traditionally this table runs the other way: the janam kundli gives the birth star, the birth star gives the syllable, and the syllable gives the name. The birth chart is the authority, not the name. We show the reverse lookup for reference.
Devanagari from our transliteration engine; the root number is the Chaldean reduction of the spelling shown.
| Name | Devanagari | Syllable | Chaldean root | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nadeem | नदीम | Na | 6 ♀ | |
| Nagma | नग्मा | Na | 5 ☿ | |
| Naina | नैना | Na | 4 ♅ | |
| Nand | नंद | Na | 6 ♀ | |
| Narayan | नरयन | Na | 7 ♆ | |
| Narender | नरेंदेर | Na | 2 ☽ | |
| Naresh | नरेश | Na | 3 ♃ | king, prince; male sovereign |
| Naveen | नवीन | Na | 9 ♂ | new |
| Navya | नव्या | Na | 5 ☿ | new, young, worth praising |
| Pankaj | पंकज | Pa | 9 ♂ | lotus |
| Pappu | पप्पु | Pa | 4 ♅ | |
| Paramjeet | परंजीत | Pa | 4 ♅ | |
| Pardeep | पर्दीप | Pa | 6 ♀ | |
| Pari | परि | Pa | 3 ♃ | fairy; angel |
| Parkash | प्रकाश | Pa | 4 ♅ | light |
| Parmod | प्रमोद | Pa | 8 ♄ | joy, delight, happiness |
| Parth | पर्थ | Pa | 2 ☽ | a name of Arjuna; son of Pritha |
| Parveen | पर्वीन | Pa | 5 ☿ | |
| Parwati | पर्वति | Pa | 5 ☿ | |
| Pawan | पवन | Pa | 3 ♃ | air, breeze, wind |
| Payal | पायल | Pa | 5 ☿ | an anklet |
| Pinki | पिंकि | Pi | 8 ♄ | |
| Pinky | पिंक्य | Pi | 8 ♄ | |
| Pintu | पिंतु | Pi | 6 ♀ | |
| Piyush | पियुश | Pi | 6 ♀ | |
| Pooja | पूजा | Pu | 6 ♀ | worship, veneration |
| Poonam | पूनम | Pu | 5 ☿ | the night or day of the full moon |
| Puja | पूजा | Pu | 7 ♆ | worship, veneration |
| Punit | पुनित | Pu | 6 ♀ | |
| Puran | पूर्ण | Pu | 4 ♅ | complete, whole, entire |
| Pushpa | पुश्पा | Pu | 4 ♅ | |
| Shabana | शबना | Sha | 9 ♂ | |
| Shabnam | शबनम | Sha | 3 ♃ | dew |
| Shahid | शहिद | Sha | 1 ☉ | |
| Shalini | शलिनि | Sha | 1 ☉ | |
| Shalu | शलु | Sha | 9 ♂ | |
| Shama | शमा | Sha | 5 ☿ | |
| Shankar | शंकर | Sha | 1 ☉ | happiness-causing |
| Shanti | शांति | Sha | 1 ☉ | peace, tranquility, quiet, ease |
| Sharda | शर्दा | Sha | 7 ♆ | |
| Shashi | शशि | Sha | 9 ♂ | moon |
| Shaurya | शौर्या | Sha | 1 ☉ | valour, bravery |
A blank meaning is a meaning we have not verified. We would rather leave the cell empty than fill it with a plausible guess.
Every name above reduced by the Chaldean method — how Kanya actually distributes, counted rather than asserted.
| Root | Ruling planet | Names | Fields traditionally favoured |
|---|---|---|---|
| Root 5 | ☿ Mercury | 7 | Media, SaaS / Tech, Communication |
| Root 6 | ♀ Venus | 7 | Luxury, Fashion, Beauty |
| Root 4 | ♅ Uranus | 6 | Construction, Engineering, Manufacturing |
| Root 1 | ☉ Sun | 5 | Leadership, Politics, Entrepreneurship |
| Root 9 | ♂ Mars | 5 | Defence, Sports, Surgery |
| Root 3 | ♃ Jupiter | 4 | Education, Publishing, Wisdom-focused brands |
| Root 7 | ♆ Neptune | 3 | Research, Spirituality, Independent consulting |
| Root 8 | ♄ Saturn | 3 | Banking, Insurance, Real estate |
| Root 2 | ☽ Moon | 2 | Hospitality, Diplomacy, Wellness |
Uttara Phalguni (padas 2, 3 and 4), Hasta (all four padas) and Chitra (padas 1 and 2). A rashi spans 30° and a nakshatra 13°20′, so every rashi works out to two and a quarter nakshatras — nine padas in all.
By the Avakahada chakra: To, Pa, Pi, Pu, Sha, Na, Tha, Pe and Po. All 9 belong to the rashi; the pada the child was actually born in narrows it to a single sound, and that comes from the birth chart, not from this list.
They name the same 30° of the zodiac, and Kanya is normally translated as Virgo. They are not interchangeable in practice. Rashi in the Indian tradition is the Moon's sign measured against the fixed stars (Lahiri ayanamsa); a Western sun sign is the Sun's position measured against the equinox. The two zodiacs currently sit about 24.2° apart, so a baby who is Virgo by the newspaper column is very often not Kanya rashi at all.
No — the birth chart does. The chakra runs the other way: a pandit reads the Moon's nakshatra and pada from the janam kundli and hands the family a syllable to start the name with. Read in reverse, as this page reads it, a syllable tells you which star the sound belongs to and nothing about your child.
It is a tradition, not a rule. Plenty of families take the syllable as a shortlist and plenty choose the name they love regardless; both are ordinary. Where it does matter is the namkaran ceremony, which is why the sound usually comes from the pandit before the shortlist is drawn up.
Enter the date of birth and we compute the Moon's actual nakshatra and pada, instead of reading it backwards from the name.
Check a nameThe 3 nakshatras that fall in Kanya
The other rashis — Simha before it, Tula after it in the zodiac
The root numbers these names carry