Anshuman and Kapila

Some time passed, but his sons were not returning. Sagara was worried. He asked Anshusham to go look for his uncles. Anshuman was the son of Asmanjas. Hunting around Asmanjas retraced the path taken by his uncles and finally reached the place where Kapila was meditating. On the way to the nether world he saw a blue elephant who were holding the earth on its tusks. He bowed down to the elephants which should he go in search of his uncles and the horse. The elephant pointed him towards the white elephant standing there. The blue elephant also told him to be polite and speak nicely to all he met.
Anshuman bowed down to the white elephant who pointed him to where a red elephant was standing.
These three elephants together were supporting the earth. If they shook their heads, earthquakes and tremors would happen on the earth.
The Red elephant pointed him towards the ashrama of Kapila, where Anshuman saw the horse bound.
Falling prostate on the ground, Anshuman bowed down before the sage and wanted to know if he had seen the sons of Sagara.
Seeing Anshuman's devotion, Kapila was pleased. He said the princes had tried to hit him and had called him a thief. Pointing to a pile of ashes, he said they were the unfortunate sons of Sagara. He also said, if Ganga was brought there, his uncles would attain salvation.
Anshuman wanted to know from the sage who was Ganga and where he would find Ganga.

Sagara's sons burnt

One day Sagara decided to perform the Ashwamedha Yagna. He asked his sons to protect the horse of the sacrifice.  Sagara was afraid that Indra would try to steal the horse.
Sagara wanted to rule and become an emperor which is why he wanted to perform the sacrifice. Indra, in the heavens, thought Sagara wanted to take over his land too. He went to Brahma and wanted to know what to do. Brahma asked him to steal the horse. One time, in the middle of the night, when all the sons who were guarding the horse had fallen asleep, Indra stole the horse seeing this as a chance, and hid the horse in the nether world, in the ashrama of rishi Kapila.
The rishi was busy in his meditation, and never realized when Indra came and tied the horse there, and left.
When night was over, the brothers were shocked to see the horse missing. Having searched everywhere, they decided to search in the nether world. With spades, they started digging deep into the earth to go and below and explore the world there. They found the horse tied there, in the ashrama of Kapila.
Thinking Kapila had stolen the horse, they started abusing the sage, calling him a horse thief.

His meditation broken, the sage opened his eyes and saw the Sagara princes abusing him. Flames shot out of his eyes, and the sons of Sagara were instantly burnt to ashes.

Sagara and Asmanjas

Ruhidas ruled the kingdome wisely. He had a son called Sagara, who became king after him. Sagara had no children. He decided to retire into the forests and pray for a child. He prayed to Shiva who appeared before him. He asked Shiva to bless him with many sons. Shiva smiled and said you will have sixty thousand sons. The king went home happy.

The king had two wives - Sumati and Kesini. In time, both wives conceived. Kesini gave birth to beautiful son, who was called Asmanjas. Sumati gave birth to a mass of flesh. From this were born sixty thousand sons.

The king was proud of his sons and started boasting around. The gods angry cursed that the sons would meet an untimely death.

The sons began growing up. Sagara was busy with the sixty thousand sons, Asmanjas was busy with his education. Sometime he discovered that Vishnu was the ultimate truth. He wanted to leave everything but somehow being the eldest, he was not allowed to. He thought of an alternative. If he started troubling people around him, he would be sent away.

He started by pushing boys into ponds and rivers; breaking pots of women carrying water; setting fire to peoples' goods etc. People went and complained to his father. Angry, Sagara banished Asmanjas. Happily Asmanjas went away.

Harishchandra

After the death of his father, Harischandra became king of Ayodhya. He got married to the princess Shavya. He had a son called Ruhidas.
Let us deviate a bit and talk off Indra. One day, Indra was enjoying the dance of five apsaras. During the course of the dance, they missed a beat. Angry Indra cursed them to trapped in the ashrama of Rishi Vishwamitra. When they wanted to know how they would be freed, they were told that once king Harischandra came there, they would be free.
The apsaras went to the ashrama of Vishwamitra. They could not get out. Vishwamitra was not there, so not knowing what to do, they starting playing with the trees in the ashrama, and in the process ended up breaking many branches.
When Vishwamitra came back, he was surprised to see this. He put a curse - who ever tried to do this, would end up getting bound by creepers in the ashrama. The apsaras got bound.
The next day, Harischandra came there. He was out hunting, and seeing the ashrama on the way, he had stopped by. The apsaras started calling out to him. Looking to see who was calling him, the king touched the creepers that bound the apsaras and they got freed.
Vishwamitra was not in his ashrama at the moment. The king went back home.
Next day when Vishwamitra was walking around his ashrama, he noticed the apsaras missing. He closed his eyes and realized it was Harischandra who had freed them. Angry he went to the king.
The king was glad and welcomed the sage with open heart.
The sage asked the king, why had he freed the apsaras that he had bound.
The king said I have not knowingly done anything wrong and I always follow the path of truth. I give away all I can to the needy and people know me as such,
The sage said if you take pride in being a provider of alms, then promise me you will give me what I ask for.
The king said he would do so, and he would not deviate from the path of truth.
The sage then said, Let all gods be witness, O king. Give me your land, your kingdom over to me.
The king agreed. He got three fists full of soil, and by giving that over the sage, he symbolically handed over his land to the sage. The sage along with the land I need wealth.
The king said he had a treasury full, and he would give from there.
The sage, having donated his kingdom away , he had no right over the treasury now.
The sage told the king to go to the land of Varanasi and stay there, along with his wife and son. There he would have to earn wealth and hand it over. The sage gave a time of seven days within which the gold would have to handed over to him.
The king did not know how to get the wealth. His queen then told him to sell her in the market and hand over to the sage whatever wealth he would get. The king went to the market.
A brahman came and bought both the queen and her son. What Harischandra could get was only a part of the the amount he needed to give the sage. The sage refused to take part of the amount and demanded the full amount.
Harishchandra went back to the market and there he put himself up for sale. A person called Kalu, who burnt corpses in the crematorium agreed to take Harishchandra as his helper. The king first took the amount and handed over what was due, to Vishwamitra and then went off with the person who had bought him.
His duty was to look after the pigs that this person had. He was also told to take money as a collection from all, who came to burn their dead in Varanasi.
In time, the king became dark from roaming around with the pigs and the smoke of the burning grounds. Anyone who knew him as the king, would not be able to recognize him.
In the brahman's house, the queen and her son served as servants. One day the brahman asked the queen to send her son to the garden and get from flowers for the worship. He was bitten there by a snake and he fell dead.
Seeing her son not returning, the queen went in search of her son and found him, lying dead in the garden.

(There is one part which I had skipped here. The queen used to be given a portion of the fodd that she would share with her son. The brahman seeing this decided to engage the son in gathering flowers for his worship. In lieu of that, he would give the son additional food, so he would not have to eat his mother's share. The garden where the prince had been was actually the garden of Visxhwanitra. He plucked flowers and came back home, When Vishwamitra realized that Harishchandra's son had plucked his flowers, he put a curse that, if came again, he would be bitten by a snake, who would strike him on his chest. The next day, when the boy came again, the snake was in the branches of the trees and the boy got bitten.)

She started lamenting. A king's daughter now a slave, and now her son also dead. She decided to end her life by entering the pyre in which she would burn her son. She went to the same place where her husband was now serving.

Harischandra saw the queen come. His senses blinded, he could not recognize his wife. He just saw a woman carrying the dead body of a child. He demanded money from her, for burning the dead. She said she had no wealth to give and the king told her to go somewhere else with the dead.

She did not know what to do. She said all she had with her was the garment that was covering her body, and she could give half of that away. She started crying out to her husband to come and help her.  The king realizing, told the lady to stop crying. I am the unfortunate king - he said.

The queen said this is my fate. I am here with a dead son and a cremation ground guard now calls himself my husband. When I was the queen of Ayodhya, people like this would not dare show their face.

The king said I know you, princess of Somdatta. You are Shavya. You married me and we had a son called Ruhidas. Vishwamitra took my kingdom away.

The queen looked at the king. The eyes looked like her husband's eyes. Both then started weeping at the death of their only son. Finally both decided that they would burn their son and enter the pyre and burn along with their dead son.

They set up a wood pyre and then putting their son in the middle and the king and queen sat on two sides of the pyre.

King of Death, Yama then came there. On his touch, the dead boy came back to life. Vishwamitra came there. He said all the good will he had earned by his penances were lost because of the kingdom he had got from Harischandra. He handed over the kingdom back to the rightful king.

Harishchandra returned back to Ayodhya with his wife and son.

When it was time, Ruhidas was made king of Ayodhya.

When Harishchandra passed away, he made his way towards heaven. Many animals like dogs and pigs also started going with the king, heavenwards.

Vishnu was amazed to see this. He did not like the fact that these animals were entering the heaven. He called Narada and asked why this was happening. Narada went and asked Harischandra why he wanted to go to heaven.

Proud of what he had done, the king started boasting about his feats.

The more he boasted, more he came downwards. Seeing this, the king stopped. The animals went back to their land, the king got stuck midways between heaven and earth.

008 Birth of Harit

Mandhata's son was Muchkunda, who had a son called Prithu, who could travel over the oceans with ease. Prithu had a som called Ishkawaku. He had Narada and Vashishtha as his guides. He had a son called Shatavarta whose son was called Aryavarta. Aryavarta had a son called Bharata. His sone was Bhudhar whose son was Khanda.Khanda had a son called Danda.
Danda was a person of bad character. He could not control himself if he saw a good looking woman. He would kidnap and ravish her.
People went to his father and complained saying they would not be able to live in Ayodhya and would need to leave the place, because of the atrocities levied on them by Danda.

Thinking that marriage would change him, Khanda got his son married. He sent his son to a nearby forest where Danda setup his kingdom, in the forest called Dandaranya. The sage Shukra used to live there. Danda used to go to the sage to learn from him.

One day when Danda went to the sage, he saw that the sage was not at home. He saw that the sage had a beautiful daughter Abja, who was picking flowers for worship. Danda said he wanted to make love to her but the maiden refused. She said , You are a student of my father, thus you are like my brother. What you are saying is sinful. Please discard these thoughts. If you want me, you will have to marry me, and for that you will have to ask my father for my hand.

Danda he would think of marriage later, first he wanted her. When the maiden refused, he forcibly ravished the virgin maiden. In the evening when Shukra came home, his daughter gave him seat to sit. Shukra wanted to know why his daughter looked different and behaved differently. With tears in her eyes, Abja told her father what had happened. He sent forth for Danda. Danda came there and stood before the sage. The sage asked him if this was the gratitude shown for the knowledge given. With fiery eyes, Shukra looked at Danda and the prince was instantly burnt to ashes.

With Danda no more, there was no one to carry the line of the king of Ayodhya.In Ayodhya, the sage Vashistha reluctantly took the reigns of the kingdom on his shoulder. A sage was meant for worship, and not ruling a land. Meditating, he realized that Abja would give birth to a son. He approached Shukra and asked him to send his daughter to Ayodhya. She was to be the mother of the future king of Ayodhya. Shukra agreed and Abja went to live in the palace in Ayodhya. She soon gave birth to son who was named Harit.

Harit was crowned king when he was old enough. One day he asked his mother how she was widowed at a young age. Abja explained to Harit, the story of his birth and also told him that she was never married to his father.

Harit had a son named Haribij. Haribij then had a son called Harishchandra.

007 The Pregnant King

The first person was Niranjan who had three sons, Brahma, Vishnu and Maheshwar. After three sons, he had a daughter called Kandini. She married Narada, son of Jaratkaru. They had a daughter called Bhanu. Bhanu married Jamadagni and Vishnu was born as their son. By the grace of Brahma, a son was born, who was named Marichi. Marichi had a son Kashyapa. Surya was born as the son of Kashyap. Manu was the son of Surya and Sushena, son of Manu.
His son was Yuvanashwa. He became the king of Ayodhya. He married the daughter of king Kandaka.
Though he had married his wife, he would not sleep with her. He was busy with worship and had no time for his wife. Not able to do anything, the queen went to her father and told him. The king began cursing his son in law.
Not knowing what to do, Yuvanashwa went to the priests and asked them to help him have a child. The priests found this funny. How could a man, who would not touch a woman, think of having a child? They asked him to do a worship and please the Gods. If they were pleased, there was a possibility. They told him to give the holy water to his queen, and then the queen could conceive, once she drank that water.
Happy, the king went about performing the worship and kept the water, in his room. He thought of giving to his wife in the morning. It was evening, and tired the king went to sleep.
In the night, the king woke up feeling very thirsty. In his sleep, he drank the water kept for the queen.
In the morning, the priests called the king and asked him to hand over the water to the queen. The king said, he had by mistake, drunk up the water.
The priests told him, he would now have to bear the child himself.
In time, the king started showing signs of being pregnant. After sometime, the king's stomach had to be cut open, and the king gave birth to a son. The king died in the process. Brahma appeared and named the son, Mandhata.
When it was time, Mandhata became the king of Ayodhya.

006 Lunar Dynasty

When the cosmic ocean was churned, the Moon arose from the waters. He had a son called Budha (বুধ) . Budha had a son named Purascha. Purascha had a son, Shatavarta. .Shatavarta had a son, Sarga. Sarga had a son called Shweta, who then had a son called Nimi. From his body was born his son Mithi. He was the one who founded the kingdom of Mithila. He had two sons Viradhwaja and Kushadhwaja. In this dynasty, Lakshmi was born as Sita.