Menaka comes to show their baby to Vishwamitra but the Maharishi point blankly refuses to acknowledge the birth of the child, not willing to look at the girl child even. Menaka, the apsara, decides to go back to her abode in the heavens, leaving the new-born baby on the banks of the river near sage Kanva's ashram. The pious sage finds the child and seeing the Shakunta birds surrounding her, names her Shakuntala and raises her as his own.