Ramal Shastra is a dice based method of fortune telling and many books on it have been written in Sanskrit, and the names of formations (sakals) are both in Urdu and Sanskrit. It is believed that this method of predicting future by people from west Asian regions especially Arabs.
The dices used in Ramal Shastra are technically prepared by using eight metals – silver, gold, iron, lead, copper, zinc and pewter (alloy).
Each dice contains four marked cubes, tightened in wire. These are thrown at the time of a query (prashna) and the figures are noted.
A standard kundali (horoscope) contains sixteen figures (sakals) and the sakal chart is known as sthira kundali. For any prashna, the answer is drawn from the original four sakals.
The mars on the cubes are dots, a single dot is show as ‘0’ and two are show by a line. There are sixteen ways of creating formations for cubes of the dice.
The sixteen formations in Ramal Shastra are:
Lahyan, Kabejtul, Dakhil, Kabajtul Kharij, Jamat, Faraha, Ukala, Ankish, Humra, Beyaj, Nufratula Khanj, Natratula Dakhil, U – Khanj, Naki, U-Dakhil, Ijjal Tama and Tarikh.
In a fixed house chart, the houses are counted from the right to left.
The fixed sakal kundali is based on the system of sakunas (0mens) for houses occupied by the first to the sixteenth sakal, while the ramal prajna kundali is created from dices. The first four houses are created from thrown dices, and then the remaining houses sakals are determined through a complex system.
Instead of the twelve houses of an astrological horoscope, there are sixteen houses in this system. The sakalas and houses are classified subject wise as good/bad, male/female, strong/weak, and so on. Questions are answered by examining particular houses. Sakals are classified on the basis of upper and lower dots and lines.
It is believed that, in the case of a theft, the name of thief can be worked out by the Ramal method. Distances and timings of fruition are also sought by using the Harfa chakra or other devices. Annual predictions for individuals are also made using a Ramal Chart.
In the absence of dices, playing cards can also be used. The Napoleon oraculum is based on the sakals of Ramal.
Bibliography
Ramal Sastra (1975) B M Lal Published by Ramtattwa Prakash Belgam
Encyclopedia of Hinduism Volume VIII page 468 - 469