Birth Of Ganga

The river Ganga has supreme importance in Hindu religion. There are many interpretations regarding the birth of the holy river Ganga. It is said that the river Ganges came into birth when the lord Brahma washed the feet of Vishnu. In Ramayana Valmiki added that Ganges was the daughter of the mighty Himalaya and Menaka. According to his writings the Divinities made her abduction and took the river to heaven. After taking Ganga to heaven, Ganga began living inner side of the Karmandala. Karmandala is a vessel shaped spout.

On the other side in Ramayana, according to Kirittivas the lords had taken the river Ganga to the lord Shiva to marry with him. The other versions illustrate that at a time Ganga lived on Mount Kailash and for the pleasure of the god the river flowed in a spiritual manner.

Years later there was a king whose name was Sagara. He had two wives. One of his wives born sixty thousand sons magically. For the betterment of the kingdom the king went in Himalayas for ritual worship. One of the parts of this ritual worship was a horse. Due to feel jealous Indra had stolen the horse from that particular area. Seeing that, Sagara said to all his sons to go in search of the horse. And all the sons of Sagara expand every where on the Earth to find out the horse.

After a hard work they found the horse in the Underworld. Where a sage was performing the meditation. The sage who was doing the meditation was Kapila. The children conceived that the horse was stolen by the sage Kapila. They started blaming the sage and become the cause of interruption during his penance. Being disturbed, the sage opened the eyes breaking his worship when years had passed. And saw the sons of the king there. The sage looked in rage at the sons of Sagara and all the sixty thousand sons were burnt to death. Until the ultimate religious rite completed all the spirits of the sons kept wondering.

After all this unfortunate happenings Bhagiratha, son of Dilip promised to be brought the Ganga to Earth. Because the water of the Ganga could purify the souls of the sons and led them to paradise. And Bhagiratha offered prayer to Brahma to get the Ganga down to the Earth. Bhagiratha succeeded to agree Brahma, and he ordered the Ganga to go down to Earth. This made Ganga to feel insulting. And she decided that when she fell on earth the entire earth be swept by Ganga. At that time Bhagiratha experienced the moment dangerous and prayed to lord Shiva to break Ganga's descent. In arrogance ganga fell on the head of Shiva. But Shiva trapping Ganges in his hairs, and harmoniously disclose her in small streams.