King Trishanku and his transformation into a coconut

Thu June 9, 2011 by Kunal Bansal

Once there was a king named Trishanku in a village called Ramnagar. He was a wise king, with a great heart. He used to treat his subjects equally. His subjects were very grateful to have a king like him. He had one wish. He wanted to go to heaven. He wanted to see the heaven, as he had heard many stories about the same. He helped sage Vishwamitra once during his rule. The sage wished to pay him back by fulfilling his desire. The sage started performing the pooja to send Trishanku to heaven. As the pooja was going on, the King started rising towards heaven. On the way to the heaven, Lord Indra the king of all Gods, saw Trishanku entering the gates on the way to the heaven. He got angry and he caught hold of Trishanku and threw him back towards the earth. Vishwamitra saw this conduct of Indra and shouted back at him. He said, ?Lord Indra, let Trishanku enter the heaven. Let him be there.? At this point of time, Trishanku was held were he was. He was held in between the earth and Heaven. Lord Indra did not allow him to ascend upwards and Vishwamitra did not let him descend down wards. He got confused with the behavior of the two. Vishwamitra knew the anger of Lord Indra. But he too decided not to give up. He knew that without any support from the earth, Trishanku would finally fall down due to the gravity of the earth. So he put a pole in support below Trishanku. It is said that, the pole finally got transformed into coconut tree and King Trishanku became the fruit on the top of the tree. Trishanku?s beard became the fibre of the coconut tree. When one removes the fibre off the coconut, one can see two black circles. Those were considered the eyes of the king.