Shakunthala and Dushyantha

Viswamithra was a powerful king. Once he wanted to conduct a very famous religious ceremony  called 'Yagnam' which he wanted to conduct with the adviser to the Devas, Vasishtar. But Vasishtar ignored his invitation as he was so pious, holy and had innumerable boons with him. So Viswamithra also wanted to become such a sage and started to do penance and his penance was so intense the Deva's king Indra got afraid and sent one of the beautiful damsels of the Heaven to dance in front of him and disturb his penance. The damsel Maenaka came down to earth and started to dance, sing and did everything to disturb Viswamithra’s penance and made him fall in love with her and she conceived and delivered a baby girl to him and went back to heaven.

This baby girl was christened as Shakunthala and grew up. Once king Dushyantha came to the forest to hunt and saw Shakunthala and fell in love with her and they married in secret and  before  leaving her he gave her a ring so that she will remember him always.

After Dushyantha left for his kingdom Shakunthala was worried and suffered in isolation and was full of love and affection for her husband and missed his presence. At this time sage Durvasa came there to get some food. Shakuntala  in her lovelorn condition could not remember or felt his presence and sage Durvasa who was always angry and in tension cursed her so that her lover Dushyanth would forget her for ever.  Coming to senses Shakunthala apologized to Sage Durvasa and pleaded for mercy. But curses could not be taken back. So Durvasa modified the curse so that Dushyantha would remember her once he sees his ring which he presented to Shakunthala. Saying this Durvasa  left.

Shakunthala became pregnant and Vismamithra came to know of this and inquired Shakunthala and found from her that Dushyanth was the cause of the pregnancy and took his daughter to him to get them officially married as their marriage was in secret.

While they were going on the boat crossing the river Ganga, Shankunthala had her hand inside the water playing with the fish and other aquatic creatures and by doing this her finger became thinner and the ring became loose and fell into the water.

Viswamithra and Shankunthala reached the palace of Dushyanth and met him while he was in audience and pleaded the case of Shankunthala. But because of Durvasa’s curse Dushyanth could not remember Shakunthala and refused to accept her as his wife. Whatever pleading and threatening Viswamithra did was not effective and hence the father and daughter had to come back to their abode rejected by Dushyanth.

 In due course  Shakunthala delivered a boy and he was christened as Barath. ( it is his name which is used to denote India as Bharath even today). The boy grew up playing with deers, lions and other jungle animals.

One day one fisherman caught a big fish from river Ganga and when he cut it open he saw a royal ring and he took it to king Dushyanth. King Dushyanth saw the ring and immediately remembered Shakunthala and came running to the jungle, saw her and her son and apologized to Sage Viswamithra and took Shakunthala and his son to his kingdom and palace and they lived happily for ever.