We Matched 32 of 36 Gunas — and Still Couldn’t Make It Work

The astrologer in Begumpet had stopped reading mid-sentence and said, “Thirty-two out of thirty-six. The best score I have seen this season.” Both sets of parents looked at each other across the marble table and smiled the way parents smile when a verdict they wanted has been delivered. The chai got refilled twice. The conversation pivoted immediately to muhurta, then to caterer, then to the question of how many days the function should run. The score had decided. Or so all six of us believed.

Setup

My name, for this telling, is Pranati. I am 31, a marketing manager at a consumer goods company in HITEC City, born and raised in Hyderabad. Rahul is 33, a chartered accountant at a Big Four firm in the same city, from a Telugu Brahmin family that has lived in Secunderabad for three generations.

(This story is a composite of three couples who shared their experiences.)

We were introduced through family friends in late 2018, when I was 24 and Rahul was 26. The first meeting was awkward in a way that felt promising. The second meeting was comfortable. By the third meeting both of us were thinking yes. The kundali matching happened in March 2019 with a 32/36 score. Engagement in April. Wedding in late November.

I want to be careful here. This is not a story about the score being wrong. The 32/36 was real. The cancellation rules that applied to the small dosha flags in our chart were real. The astrology was, by every measurable standard, excellent. This is a story about what excellent astrology cannot tell you.

What the chart got right

The Begumpet astrologer was not negligent. He went through all 8 Kootas carefully. Varna: matched. Vashya: matched. Tara: matched. Yoni: 3 out of 4, strong. Graha Maitri: 5 out of 5, ideal. Gana: 6 out of 6, perfect. Bhakoot: 7 out of 7, clean. Nadi: 0 out of 8, the only failure.

The Nadi flag was the one concern. We both belonged to madhya nadi. The astrologer applied the cancellation rule. Our Moon signs were different, mine in Cancer and Rahul’s in Scorpio. Different rashis with same nadi triggered the standard cancellation. The astrologer applied it. The chart, with cancellation, was as clean as a chart gets in modern matching.

He also looked at the Navamsa. Both of us had benefics in the 7th house of the D9. Jupiter for Rahul, Venus for me. The astrologer said in his fifteen years of practice he had seen perhaps twenty charts this clean.

What none of this captured was that Rahul and I, as people, did not know how to be married. We were not bad people. We were not even badly matched in any way the texts measure. We were two introverts who had never lived with another introvert before. We did not know how to handle a difficult day together. We did not know how to ask for space without it sounding like rejection. We did not know how to come back from an argument that had not been resolved by sundown.

The slow erosion

The first year was fine. Honeymoon, new apartment in Kondapur, both of our families flowing in and out. The second year was thin. Pandemic. We were locked in a 900-square-foot flat for fourteen months. We had thought we knew how to be together. We did not know how to be unable to leave.

The third year was the hardest. Both of us went to therapy, separately. Rahul saw a counsellor recommended by his firm’s wellness program. I saw a psychologist in Banjara Hills. Both of us, independently, were told we needed couples counselling, not individual sessions, and that the work we needed to do was joint. Neither of us could quite agree to it. I told myself I was waiting for him to suggest it. He, I later learned, was waiting for me.

The fourth year we stopped trying. We were polite. We were kind to each other on small things. We were unable to find our way back to the thing that had made the third meeting in 2018 feel comfortable. We separated in November 2023, exactly four years after our wedding. The divorce was finalised in early 2024, both of us using the same family lawyer, both of us crying at the registrar’s office because we were not angry at each other, just genuinely sorry the marriage had not worked.

What the chart cannot measure

I want to be careful here too. I do not believe the chart was wrong. The chart measured the things the chart measures. The astrology was honest. What I believe now is that 36 Gunas was never meant to be a complete picture. It measures certain ritual and energetic compatibilities. It does not measure whether two people know how to sit with a difficult silence together. It does not measure whether two introverts have ever lived with another introvert. It does not measure conflict skills, repair patterns, or capacity for joint therapy.

A few months after the separation, I ran our charts through Sahita. I wanted to see the breakdown again, without the marriage I had built on top of it. The numbers were the same. The cancellation rules were the same. The Navamsa was the same. The chart was as clean as I remembered. Sahita has, in plain English at the bottom of every match report, a line that I had not absorbed in 2019. “A favourable guna score is one indicator of compatibility. It does not guarantee marital harmony, which depends on many factors outside the scope of astrological matching.” I read that line, four years too late, the way you read a label on a medication you have already finished taking.

What I tell people now

When friends ask me to look at their match because of my story, I tell them three things.

One: A high score is good news, not a guarantee. Treat it as the absence of structural red flags, not as a promise.

Two: Run the check yourself, in plain English, and read the cancellation rules for the doshas that do appear. The texts have wisdom that should not be skipped.

Three: Before the wedding, ask yourselves how you will handle a hard day. Not in the abstract. Specifically. Have you ever been in a small flat with this person for fourteen days without leaving? Have you watched them get angry about something small? Have you watched them get small about something they were sad about? If the answer is no, find a way to find out before the cards go to the printer.

If you are running a check tonight

If you are running a check tonight, Sahita is free, takes 2 minutes, walks through every cancellation rule in plain English. 36 Gunas, 8 Kootas, the dosha panel, the downloadable PDF, the small honest line at the bottom about what the chart does and does not measure. Free forever. No paywall. Get it on Play Store: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appsapien.sahita

You can read more on another high-score divorce story, whether to match kundli for a second marriage, or the counterpoint, a low-score marriage that worked.

FAQ

Is a 32 out of 36 guna score really considered excellent?

A 32/36 score is considered very strong. Anything above 18 is conventionally acceptable, above 24 is good, and above 30 is excellent. The score reflects the 8 Kootas of guna milan, which measure ritual and energetic compatibility but do not capture every dimension of marital health.

Can a marriage with a high guna score still fail?

Yes. Guna milan is one input among many, not a guarantee. Classical Vedic astrology has always treated the score as a screening indicator, not a verdict. Factors outside the scope of the chart, communication patterns, conflict skills, life-stage differences, and individual mental health, can erode a marriage with any score.

What do the 36 Gunas actually measure?

The 36 Gunas are distributed across 8 Kootas: Varna (1 point), Vashya (2), Tara (3), Yoni (4), Graha Maitri (5), Gana (6), Bhakoot (7), and Nadi (8). Each Koota measures a specific compatibility dimension. Together they assess broad astrological compatibility, not marriage outcome.

What does Sahita actually do?

Sahita is a free Vedic kundali matching app that calculates the 36 Gunas across 8 Kootas, flags doshas like Nadi and Manglik, and shows which classical cancellation rules apply to a specific pair of charts. It is honest in its summary line that the chart cannot guarantee marital harmony. Free forever on Play Store.

Should couples with high scores still do pre-marital counselling?

Many therapists and counsellors recommend pre-marital sessions regardless of astrological compatibility. The conversation surfaces patterns that the chart does not measure, especially around conflict, repair, and capacity for joint work over time. A high score and a good counsellor are not in tension.

Does Sahita recommend marriage counselling?

Sahita does not recommend specific counsellors. The app is a matching tool, not a therapy service. Many couples we have heard from say they wished they had done pre-marital counselling in addition to running the kundali check, especially in the months between engagement and wedding when both partners are still learning how to be partners.