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Vedic Addition

Welcome to the first topic of Vedic Mathematics! Here, we will learn basic Vedic Addition.
Vedic Addition is super easy, you just need to know single-digit addition!

Let us start with a very simple sum-

29+34

Step 1: Add all numbers belonging to the same place (tens, units) and write their sums down as shown in the picture below
 

img1and2.png

Step 2: Now, you would have 2 numbers, 5 and 13 written like 05 | 13. What you want to do now is write the first number (3) below and then carry the remaining (1) to (05). Add both numbers which will give you 6. Write it to the left of the 3 which you wrote below.

img1and2.png

This is called as the balancing rule. You've got the answer!

In Addition, we only use balancing rule in base 10. Bases are powers of 10 ( 10, 100, 1000...). When a number is close to 10, its base is 10. When it is closer to 100, its base is 100 and so on...
1-50 = base 10
51- 500 = base 100
501- 5000 = base 1000 and so on.

In base 10 balancing rule, we only wrote down one digit at a time, but in base 100, we write 2 digits at a time, 3 digits in base 1000, 4 digits in base 10000 and so on...

*For now, this might just seem like regular addition, but when adding large numbers, you will notice how much less time it takes to add the numbers!

Some examples-

1) 441 + 435 + 196
 

image3addition.png

After adding the numbers from their respective places, we get 09 | 16 | 12 ( 9 is the sum of the numbers at the hundreds place, 16 is the sum of numbers at the tens place and so on.

Now, using the balancing rule, we can get the answer easily. We write the 2 down, carry 1 to 16, add them to get 17, write 7 down, carry over the remaining 1 and add it to 09 to get 10 and write it down as it is to get 1072 as the answer.

2) 2133 + 961 +1657

image4addition.png

We get 03 | 16 | 14 | 11 after adding the numbers. Now using the Balancing rule, the first (1) in (11) is written down as it is. The remaining (1) is carried to (14). Adding the two gives us (15). The (5) in (15) is written down and the (1) is carried over to add to (16) which gives us (17). (7) is written down and (1) is carried over to (03) to give us (04) and (4) is written down to give us the number 4751.


An important tip: After adding the numbers of corresponding places, if you get single digit numbers, be sure to put a 0 before them to avoid mistakes. (i.e. 09, 06 etc.)

 

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