Kali Drives Change in India

Indians have taken to the streets to protest against violence against women.

India, the world's biggest democracy, is a great big bhel puri of languages, religions, customs and manners.  Special interests are as diverse as religious customs, but for the past month Indians have been united in their outrage at the rape and murder of a medical student in the capital, New Delhi.

This is because of the vileness of this particular crime, but also because violence against women is a serious problem across the sub-continent. According to official figures, a woman is raped every 14 hours in Delhi. In India, you have to guard your daughters, and for some men, a woman without her family is fair game. But Indian society is changing rapidly, and attitudes to women are too. Not so long ago, the victim's family might have been made to feel too ashamed to make a fuss. But now millions of ordinary men and women have actively demonstrated their support and anger.

Kidnap and rape are redolent of the energies of Pluto, the god of the underworld, Ceres, who's daughter Proserpine was kidnapped by Pluto, and Lilith, dark wildness. The fact is many, many women are raped in India every year, but this particular attack has galvanised the public to take action. So I thought it would be worth looking at how the planets are working in the Indian chart right now.

The assault took place on 16 December, the victim died on the 29th, protests began almost immediately and are on-going. Yesterday, her companion, who was beaten with an iron bar, gave a TV interview detailing what he could remember of the attack and how poorly the authorities responded.

On the day of the attack, transiting Lilith and Jupiter were conjunct in India's first house. Lilith is prominent in the charts of serial killers and rapists, and here it is again, exaggerated by Jupiter. But this is also in the first house and in Gemini, so unlikely to stay hidden. The rapists were arrested within 24 hours. Lilith-Jupiter was at an awkward but exact angle to transiting Pluto, a quincunx, an angle of agitation.

Ceres, the Roman equivalent of Demeter goddess of agriculture, would not give up when her daughter disappeared. She searched and searched until she found out where Proserpine had gone and then made a deal with Proserpine's abductor Pluto, so that she could have her daughter back for some of the year.

Transiting Ceres was conjunct India's natal Uranus and getting closer when the rape took place, as protests escalated, the conjunction became exact. Uranus has been closely involved during so much of the people-power wave of protest that we've seen sweeping the globe.

It seems to me that the goddess
 Kali and Lilith are two avatars
of the same energy.

And here's another exact quincunx:  transiting Uranus to India's natal Chiron. Interestingly, it also squares India's Vesta. Now Vesta is the domestic goddess. The honour of the household is invested in Vesta. India's national domestic goddess has been dissed. Not only has she been squared by Uranus, she is being opposed more widely by Pluto, the rapist. So the Uranus-Pluto square is in action here.

Transiting Venus, the planet that represents young women, was at the critical 29th degree of Scorpio. She's in her fall in Scorpio, her worst placement traditionally. It is always something of a journey through the underworld for her, and this degree is on India's descendant.

Now all of these different factors might have stayed quietly bubbling away without bursting into flame if it had not been for transiting Mercury in Sagittarius, shooting a burning arrow straight at that dangerous Jupiter-Lilith. This is halfway between the current Saturn-Pluto sextile which is making a Yod with Jupiter. So you can see it is just like a bow and arrow. The massacre of the children in Newtown Connecticut was under the same aspects.

Both these crimes have ignited public debate about long-held beliefs and customs. The violence took place across the information axis, Gemini-Sagittarius. With those two signs involved no one is going to stay quiet.

The most exact trigger is transiting Mars, the planet of brutality, to India's natal Lilith and opposite her Moon, which represents the people, perhaps in particular India's mothers, who are, to some extent the guardians of custom. Mothers teach sons too.

The death of this young woman on December 29th has not have been in vain. To date there have been protests all over India, and also in Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh, as well as passionate debates in Parliament, a change in the law and heated discussions across Asian media. Finally, people are pouring out their anger about a subject that has been almost taboo.

The goddess is here – and she's demanding change. It's wonderful to see so much people power and such a desire for positive change come out of such a heinous crime.