| Trisanku - Part 1
 King Thirayarunan was a descendant of Surya vamsa, who ruled his Kingdom in a deft and honest way and his subjects were happy and contented under his rule. But his only son Sathyaviradhan was haughty, headstrong and flirtatious by nature.The King's heart was filled with remorse and he tried to reform him, but only met with failure.
Once a rich Brahmin celebrated his only daughter's wedding in an ostentatious manner. The bride was decked up in a silk saree and was wearing costly jewels. She looked very beautiful and attractive and was the cynosure of all eyes.
Sathyaviradhan came to know about this and hurried to the mandap with his friends. He pushed everyone aside, abducted the bride and ran away from the place. The guests, who had come to witness the wedding, were shocked beyond words. Though they knew about Sathyaviradhan's overbearing manners, they never expected him to stoop to such a level. The furious elders went to the palace and complained to the King about his son. The King, already dejected by his son's behaviour, on hearing the complaint, was heart-broken. In a fit of extreme anger, he directed Sathyaviradhan to live in exile.
Sathyaviradhan left the kingdom and went to the forest. He hunted for his food and lived the life of a vagabond. He realised what he had done was wrong but felt that the punishment meted out to him was severe which he didn't deserve. His wodered why Vasishta, their Kulaguru did not interfere and counsel the King properly at the right time. His anger turned to hatred against Vasishta. Meanwhile, the King, hearing about the life led by his son, was filled with anguish. He left his Kingdom to do penance and so the responsibility of ruling the Kingdom fell in the hands of
Vasishta.
The Kingdom faced severe drought as there had been no rainfall for 12 years. The people suffered due to the lack of availability of food and Sage Viswamitra's family was also among them. The sage had gone to river Komathi to do his penance and it was left to his wife to look after their three sons. Saddened by the situation, and unable to see her children suffer, she decided to sell her second son to buy food. When she came to the market for this purpose, Sathyaviradhan heard about her suffering and was grief-struck to see the sage's wife in such a helpless situation. He went to her and offered help by promising to bring food to their family everyday without fail and requested her to go home. Viswamitra's wife felt happy and relieved, and returned home with her sons.
 One day Sathyaviradhan unable to find an animal or a bird to hunt throughout the day, became weary and reached Vasishta's ashram. It was dusk when he arrived at the ashram and the sage's favourite cow, Nandini was grazing nearby. Sathyaviradhan did not realise that it was a cow as his vision was poor due to darkness, killed it with his bow and arrow. He cooked its meat, ate a little and left the rest near Viswamitra's house for his family to eat. Meanwhile, Vasishta, unable to find Nandini, through his clairvoyant powers found that Sathyaviradhan had killed his cow.
Livid with anger, he sent for him and cursed him thus,'' There is no end to your sinful acts. First you abducted the bride, then made your father suffer with your insolent behaviour, and now you killed my cow and ate its meat. You have committed three sins and so from now on you will go by the name 'Trisanku' (in Sanskrit, Sanku means sin) and will live
as an outcaste".
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