The rishi of ancient India applied their minds and discovered many arts and sciences for the well-being of future generation of mankind. One such science is Astrology. There are several branches  in Astrology viz. Horoscopy i.e casting and reading of horoscopes based on the positions of planets at the time of birth of a person and the movements of the planets across the zodiac. This is a well developed science as evidenced from ancient manuscripts like Brihat samhita jathaka Paarijatha etc. Palmistry, Numerology and Nadi Reading are other disciplines.

What is Nadi: These days we hear about people with powers of extra sensory perceptions, the Rishis were holy sages who occupied themselves in concentrat- ing on the One DIVINE BEING PARAMATMA. They for exceeding the powers of ESP people. More than that was able to know the future by their foresight. With this foresight the rishis like Agasthya, Koushika Vasistha have given predictions for the human beings occupying this world. Let us take for instance any particular moment of the Day. Many lives are born in this world at that given moment. Human lives, plant life and animals. The Rishis have ignored the last two and confined their predictions only to human beings. And that too not all the humans Predictions are given only for such that person who the Rishis out of their foreknowledge knew will come forward to study these predictions. The exact age in which each such person will come for this study have also been foretold by the Rishis.

These predictons were inscribed on palm leaves. Like many other arts and sciences of ancient days they were also in Sanskrit. Later day Tamil kings gather ed all such palm leaves irrespective of the subjects they dealt upon and stored them in big libraries. These leaves which are the repository of the Wisdom of ancient Rishis would otherwise have been lost to us. The king of Tanjore, a true patron of Arts and Sciences found a reserve for these palm leaves in his palace library. He also got them translated into Tamil with the help Pundits. The forefathers, Sir S Sendhilvel & brothers, living in Vaitheeswarankoil more than three hundred years back obtained these palm leaves containing the astrological inscriptions only in auction during the British rule.

Before revealing the predictions each person is first identified by furnishing his date of birth details, planetary positions as at the time of his birth, parentage, names of some close relatives, position of life, marital status etc. After this the predictions for the individual follow from the date of his studying the Nadi to his last day. The past i.e., the happenings from the date of birth to date of studying, the leaf is not covered. This is probably in order to avoid any complications arising in human lives.

THE METHOD OF STUDY
When a thumb impression from a native is obtained, it is handed over by the reader at the library. The palm-leaf bundles are classified & indexed in the library according to thumb impressions to facilitate easy searching of the bundles. For each thumb impression there likely to be around 5 to 6 bundles: each such bundle will contain 50 to 100 leaves. One particular leaf is that of the native. But the process of finding out this specific leaf is laborious and time consuming. Because the reader has to read out one statement from the first leaf and if it conforms to the native, he will read out the second to verify its veracity. If this statement does not hold true for the native, the reader passes on to the next leaf. It will therefore be evident that the reader will have to go on searching leaf after leaf, bundles after bundle to trace out the one leaf in which all the particular concerning the Native correctly appear. To expedite this process the Native has to extend his full cooperation i.e., he should listen carefully and answer correctly.

This results in the tracing out of not only leaf but also the first Kandam also called General Kandam representing the native's lagna. The General Kandam will also furnish brief predictions of the remaining 11 houses of the Native's birth  chart. If detailed predictions of any other house are required they can be studied  in the relevant Kandam given in the Annexure.

For the happening of the predictions. The Rishi insists, that the Native should be free of any previous birth sins. The Rishi therefore suggests and specifies the performance of certain parihaaras to wipe off to the maximum extent any such balance of sins. If these Remedies are performed with full involvement, the Rishi assures the happening of the events predicated by him. These are found in separate chapters called Shanthi & Deeksha.