Drawing room, office, puja room, conference room, underground water tank, borewell and a bedroom for elders suit the Shikhi pad. A main door, kitchen or toilet here harms the residents.
A home cannot keep all 45 devta pads empty. Wooden furniture placed on any devta's pad, even on its most vital point (ati marma), is not considered a dosh; the vedic rule is to protect the ashtamansh, the sensitive one-eighth part of the pad.
For a new building the boundary gate is placed using the grid of the whole plot, while the main door and the devta pads of the house are marked on the grid of the constructed area, for example at E3 or E4.
Some texts use a word read as maans (meat) in devta offerings, but Vishwakarma Prakash clearly states that maash means black urad dal, made into a pithi (paste), not meat.
Like the full aspect of Jupiter in a kundli, a devta casts its full drishti on the devta opposite it (for example Surya on Varun) and keeps it balanced; if one devta cannot be treated, balance the one whose full drishti falls on it.
E3 suits the main door, a library, a planning or meeting room, an office, a child's study and even a bedroom; a kitchen works only for an early breakfast, and a toilet cuts social and government support.
E4 suits an administration chamber, office, main door, drawing room, study and bedroom and gives both wealth and peace; a toilet here brings defamation, loss of wealth and disease.
E5 is the ideal zone for a bathroom and suits administration, a manager's chamber, a locker, planning, meeting and conference rooms and a good office; a door here brings anger and a toilet brings disgrace.
Vastu devta pooja bears fruit only when done by someone who represents Brahmin qualities by conduct rather than birth: vegetarian, of good character and pure in mind and feeling.
On the exact diagonal where the head of Shikhi devta falls in the NE, no underground water tank or pit should be dug. Vedic vastu marks these Shishu Pishach points, where neither the shilanyas pit nor any water pit is made.
Diagonal points of the plot, especially in the North-East
Interior vastu grids every room from its own centre, in addition to the house grid, and places items by the room's own zones; in a kitchen the deciding point is where the fire burns.
In the East, E3 is the best door with abundant wealth and E4 brings government support and respect, while E5 suits administrators only. E1, E6, E7 and E8 should not hold the main door.
Main door on the East side, from the North-East corner to the South-East corner
In the North, N3 brings sons and wealth, N4 (Bhallat) is the best of all 32 doors with windfall wealth, and N5 gives wealth with dharma and fame. N1, N2, N6, N7 and N8 bring suffering, enemies, family stress, faults in women and poverty.
Main door on the North side, from the North-West corner to the North-East corner
In the South only S4 (Grihakshat) gives happiness, peace, prosperity and business profit. S2, S3, S5, S6, S7 (the debt door) and S8 bring lack of children, servitude, suffering, selfishness, debt and disease.
Main door on the South side, from the South-East corner to the South-West corner
In the West, W4 (Pushpadant) showers wealth and W5 (Varun) also gives wealth, while W1, W2, W3, W6, W7 and W8 bring short life, overspending, loss of money, government trouble, disease and a destructive mind.
Main door on the West side, from the South-West corner to the North-West corner
In which direction should the ghat diya method be done?
Do not think of it as a lamp burning for 24 hours in the Agneya (South-East). Use a small diya and place it in the Ishaan (North-East), because the devtas seated in the Ishaan, such as Shikhi, help a great deal.
What should be done if the shilanyas (foundation stone) has been laid in the wrong direction?
Fix a fresh auspicious muhurta for shilanyas, dissolve (khandit) the earlier one, and perform it again in the new muhurta. It is dissolved the way an installed kalash is removed: by addressing the devtas who supported the earlier shilanyas with a request about it.
A pad is one of the equal sections into which a plot is divided. For 81 pad vastu a house, for example 90 by 90 ft, is divided into 9 by 9 equal sections and each section is one pad; the larger grids, such as the 1000 pad grid, divide the plot into many more equal sections. Some areas such as the Brahmasthan cover several padas together even if the drawing does not show their inner divisions.
In 81 pad vastu, which devtas fall in the North and North-East zones?
Exact North falls on Soma (N5), with Bhallat at N4. The North zone is made of half of Bhallat (5.625 degrees), the full Soma (11.25 degrees) and half of Bhujang (5.625 degrees); North falling between Bhallat and Soma belongs to the 64 pad grid. The North-East zone is half of Diti (5.625 degrees), the full Shikhi (11.25 degrees) and half of Parjanya (5.625 degrees).
I learned elsewhere that in 81 pad vastu the East falls between E4 and E5. Is that right?
No. In 81 pad vastu exact East falls on E5 (Surya); East between E4 and E5 belongs to the 64 pad grid, so correct it. The reference is in Vishwakarma Prakash, with the page number given in the previous class; the Hindi translation from Sanskrit by Krishna Kumar Jugnu of Udaipur and the edition of Maharshi Abhay Katyayan give the same.
The North-West was given green as its colour, but the shakti chakra shows it in blue. Why?
The colour on the chakra is the colour of the devta of that zone, not of the element; the North devtas are shown in red, for example, which is not a colour to paint there. The air element has both green and blue as its colours.
How are the 64 pad grid and the padas of each devta worked out?
Every pad grid divides the plot into equal sections, for example 81 equal sections for the 81 pad grid; the number of padas each devta occupies is then assigned within that grid. Drawing the devtas by hand will be taught practically in the 81 pad class.
Is there any length to width criterion for the centre, for example in a 250 x 50 feet plot?
There is no criterion for finding the centre; the centre is always the centre. The proportion matters for the plot itself: up to 1:1.5 is good (30 x 45 feet is ideal), up to 1:2 (30 x 60) is neither good nor bad, and longer than that is not good, with more loss the longer it gets. In such long plots many devtas fall outside or get cut, and they need treatment.
Is there any AutoCAD software for marking the marma points?
No special software is needed. Draw the chakra and devta lines once in AutoCAD as short reference lines; for every new map just align them and join the lines, which takes about a minute.
If bhoomi vibhajan is not done in a flat, is devta marking still done, given that the 32 devtas lie in the Pishach bhoomi?
Yes. Devta marking is done in a flat exactly as usual, also to judge the main door location. What does not apply is the rule of leaving the Pishach bhoomi empty: inside a flat the corners and side spaces can be used.