Bhagiratha - King or Engineer

Bhagiratha - King or Engineer:
Bhagiratha was a great king of Kosala-nadu kingdom which is approximate region of Awadh in the state of Utter Pradesh,India. It is believed that he is forefather of Lord Rama. Hindus believe King Bhagirath made crucial effect to bring River Ganga to earth from heaven.

Several Hindu holy places lie on the banks of river Ganga. Ganga raises at Himalaya mountains and touches Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal states in India and empties at Bay of Bengal. It is  trans-boundary river of countries Bangladesh and  India. Hindus believe that taking a dip in this river will liberate them from life-death cycle.

Traditional story:
Sagara, the king of Kosala-nadu chose to perform Aswamedha yaga. His servants lost the track of ritual horse. According to his sources, he believed that Lord Indra took the horse and kept it hidden under ground(pathalalokha). King Sagara ordered his 60,000 sons to track the horse. They went to underground by digging earth. At last, they found horse at Sage Kapila's place. His sons thought that Sage Kapila had theft the horse and attacked him when he was doing meditation. By this act, Sage Kapila got angry and turned  60,000 sons into ashes. To make their souls rest in peace, king sagara decided to do cremation rites by immersing their ashes in Ganges. Then he called grand-son Anshumanthu to bring river ganga to the kingdom. He did severe penance and died without succeeding the request of Sagara. Later, his son Dilipa also died without succeeding the request. Finally, Bhagiratha who is the son of Dilipa performed penance to please Ganga-devi and got succeeded on a condition to make Ganga fall on Lord Shiva  matted hair locks and then proceed to earth. Later, he done penance to Lord Shiva for stopping ganga flow using his hair locks. He got succeeded to bring Ganga river to earth from heaven with the help of Lord Shiva.

Later, Ganga river followed King Bhagiratha. On the way it immersed Sage Jhuhnu's place. Due to anger Sage Jhuhnu swallowed ganga with mouth. Bhagiratha pleased Sage Jhuhnu to release ganga. Upon his sincere request, Sage Jhuhnu released ganga from his ear and ganga went through on ashes to release 60,000 souls from Sage Kapila's curse. Hence river Ganga is called by names Bhagirathi and Jhuhnavi.

Interesting Things:

• Aswhamedha-yagam : Sacrificial horse was left freely, when ever the horse captured by others they need to fight with king or else need to leave their land.
• Unbelievably, King Sagara of the Surya Dynasty have 60,000 sons.
• Sage Kapila was meditating at underground. How a person can live beneath the earth?
• Sage Jhuhnu swallowing river which is impossible.
• Doing penance for life time by king Dilipa and Anshumanthu.
• Why do they penance for getting river Ganga to flow on earth instead of asking directly to liberate their sins?

Scientific Assumptions:

• Ashwamedha yagam was done when there is a severe drought in the place.Here 'Ashwha' means Horse but there are so many synonyms for the word Ashwha like Color,Water. Yagam means fire ritual and also have synonym 'Experiment'. When we consider Ashwamedhayagam as experiment to search water, it gives new dimension to the story.
• King Sagara have 60,000 sons represents the total population in his kingdom Koshala-nadu.
• The word Kapila mean in the synonyms as Vishnu, black color, coal.But, characterized as sage.
• When 60,000 people used to search for water by digging the land.They sighted coal mines instead of water. They went through digging the coal mines for water.This act was described as hiding horse at Sage Kapila place. Unfortunately, from the two holes big volumes of natural gas came out. Due to misfire 60,000 people turned into ashes. It can be described as Blow-out.  After blow-out they came to conclusion that there is no source of water and decided to divert river ganges to bring it to their land from highest place called heaven, which can be assumed as Himalaya mountains. In this diversion, king Anshumanthu and his son King Dilipa were died in the mean of work. King Bhagiratha succeeded with the help of Lord Shiva.
• Lord Shiva with-standing to the flow of Ganga river on his head, represents King Bhagiratha built a great dam to control the flow of Ganga river. 
• Sage Jhuhnu swallowing ganga river and releasing through ear represents, constructing a diversion channel to change the direction of ganga river.
• Sagara, Anshumanthu,Dilipa and Bhagiratha are not only kings they are also good Engineers according to my view.