01What is a mundan muhurat?
Mundan (chudakarana in the Grihya Sutras) is the samskara at which a child's hair is shaved for the first time, and a mundan muhurat is the time elected for it. Muhurta is the electional branch of Jyotish, and it asks when work that is going to be done should begin rather than what will come of it. The day is read through the panchang, and three of its five limbs decide: the nakshatra the Moon stands in, the tithi, and the vara or weekday. The samskara rites carry more household rules than a purchase does (the age of the child, the month of the year, the state of the family), and the sections below separate what this finder computes from what the texts state but it does not screen.
02Which nakshatras are auspicious for mundan?
Eleven nakshatras are named for chudakarana in the standard muhurta handbooks, and this finder scores exactly that set: Ashwini, Mrigashira, Punarvasu, Pushya, Hasta, Chitra, Swati, Jyeshtha, Shravana, Dhanishta and Revati. It is a narrower list than the one used for a naming or a first feeding, and notably it leaves out the fixed stars that head almost every other muhurta list. The reason the texts give is that a shaving is a removal rather than a founding: the classes called swift, soft and movable suit it, and the class meant for permanence does not.
The laghu (swift) stars
Ashwini, Pushya and Hasta are the laghu or kshipra class: swift, light, and assigned by the texts to work that is meant to be quick and clean. They are the core of the mundan list and the three days regional practice reaches for first. Pushya is the most used of them, and a Pushya day that also falls on a favoured weekday is the strongest ordinary result this finder returns for the occasion.
The mridu (soft) stars
Mrigashira, Chitra and Revati carry the mridu or maitra classification, the soft and friendly stars. The handbooks assign the class to gentle work done on or for the body (dress, ornament, grooming), which is the category a first shaving falls into. Revati closes the zodiac and is the star most often named in South Indian practice for the rite when a Pushya day cannot be reached.
The chara (movable) stars
Punarvasu, Swati, Shravana and Dhanishta are the chara or movable class. The texts use the class for what changes rather than what stays, and the handbooks admit it for chudakarana on the same reasoning that keeps the fixed stars out. Shravana and Dhanishta also sit inside the Panchaka span, which the results report separately so you can weigh both facts about a day at once.
Jyeshtha, the one sharp star on the list
Jyeshtha belongs to the tikshna or sharp class, which is otherwise kept well away from an auspicious beginning. The handbooks admit it for chudakarana specifically, on the strength of the class's association with cutting and with work done with a blade, and practice differs by region on how freely to use it. We include it because the classical list includes it, and we say so here rather than leaving a sharp star to appear unexplained.
03Which tithis are excluded for mundan?
The Rikta tithis and Amavasya are both dropped. Rikta means empty and names the fourth, ninth and fourteenth tithi of each paksha, six days in a lunar month across the waxing and waning fortnights. Amavasya is the dark Moon and is given in the tradition to the ancestors rather than to a samskara. The handbooks add a preference for the bright fortnight for all the childhood rites, which this finder expresses through the Moon's strength rather than as a rule of its own. You can read the running tithi for any date and city on our daily panchang.
04Which weekdays are used for mundan, and which are avoided?
Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday are the weekdays this finder counts in favour of a mundan, and Tuesday and Saturday are the two it counts against. The lordship of the day is the reasoning: the Moon, Mercury, Jupiter and Venus rule the favoured four and are the benefics of the week, while Mars rules Tuesday and Saturn rules Saturday and both are read as unsuited to a rite performed on a small child. Sunday is neutral (the texts neither recommend nor bar it for chudakarana), so Sunday dates appear in the results at a lower rating rather than not at all.
05What do the texts say about the child's age and the family's state?
These are the household rules that sit beside the panchang, and they are stated here as the tradition's rules rather than as anything this page computes. The Grihya Sutras place chudakarana in an odd year of the child's age (the first, third or fifth), and regional practice varies on which of the three. The texts hold the rite back when the Moon occupies the child's own janma nakshatra, and again while the mother is pregnant; both are widely observed in practice. Several handbooks also set aside particular lunar months, Chaitra and Pausha among them, and the lists differ between the northern and southern traditions enough that we state the disagreement rather than pick a side.
Why the odd years?
The sutras count the samskaras in odd years for the childhood rites generally, and the commentators tie it to the same reasoning that puts the odd tithis of a fortnight ahead of the even ones for a beginning. What the texts do not do is make it absolute: a child whose first and third years both passed without a suitable day is given the fifth, and the seventh is named in some regional handbooks as the last of the acceptable years.
The janma nakshatra rule
A rite is generally held back when the Moon is transiting the star it occupied at the child's birth. This finder cannot apply the rule, because it works from a date and a city and never asks for a birth time. If you know the child's janma nakshatra, our panchang names the Moon's nakshatra for each date, so the check takes a moment once you have a shortlist of days from this page.
06Which yogas raise or cancel a day for a mundan?
Named nakshatra-and-weekday pairs outrank the ordinary scoring in both directions. Four raise a day: Amrit Siddhi, Sarvartha Siddhi, Guru Pushya and Ravi Pushya. Four cancel it outright: Mrityu, Dagdha, Yamaghata and Utpata. These are the classical panchanga tables and they are checked before anything else, so a day carrying one of the cancelling four is rated avoid however good its nakshatra and tithi look. The reverse does not hold: an auspicious yoga raises a rating but does not rescue a day that Amavasya has already removed from the list.
Amrit Siddhi and Sarvartha Siddhi
Amrit Siddhi pairs one nakshatra with each weekday (Hasta on Sunday, Mrigashira on Monday, and so on through the week), and the texts read it as all-purpose. Sarvartha Siddhi, literally the accomplisher of every purpose, is a wider table of several stars per weekday. Both are reported by name in the results rather than folded into a rating, so you can see which of the two a day is actually carrying, and Pushya sits on this occasion's own nakshatra list, so Guru Pushya and Ravi Pushya both reach these results.
The four yogas that cancel a day
Mrityu, Dagdha, Yamaghata and Utpata each pair a single nakshatra with a single weekday, and the tradition holds an auspicious beginning back while one of them runs. Dagdha means burnt and Utpata means a portent; the names are the tradition's own and we keep them rather than softening them into a colour code. Because each is one pair, a cancelled day is uncommon, usually one or two in a month-long search, and the result names the yoga responsible.
07What does this mundan muhurat finder not check?
It does not read the child's chart, the mother's state or the family's own customs, and it does not screen the lunar months or the seasonal exclusions described above. None of those is a panchang limb, and inventing a rule the texts state loosely would be worse than naming it and stopping. What it computes is the nakshatra, tithi, weekday and yoga layer, from the true sunrise at the city you enter, and the clean Choghadiya and Abhijit windows inside each day it keeps. Both Amrit Siddhi and Guru Pushya or Ravi Pushya are flagged by name where they run. We sell no puja and no consultation; take the shortlist to whoever your family asks about such things.
