Artist Chaman­deep Singh dwells into the his­tory books to high­light the his­toric con­tri­bu­tion of de­vout Bhai Jaita Ji, whose im­age he uses to por­tray the af­ter­math of the mar­tyr­dom of Ninth Mas­ter Guru Tegh Ba­hadur.  WSN show­cases the re­mark­able dig­i­tal paint­ing.

YOUNG DIG­I­TAL ARTIST, Al­war-born Chaman­deep Singh Ba­tra spent hours and hours over a pe­riod of 7 months this year -the year of the fourth cen­ten­nial birth an­niver­sary of the Ninth Guru, lis­ten­ing to the po­etic ren­di­tion of the dar­ing act of Bhai Jaita Ji, a de­vout Sikh of those times, who af­ter the mar­tyr­dom of Guru Tegh Ba­hadur, car­ried his Sees-head, from Delhi to Anand­pur Sahib.

Re­search­ing the his­tor­i­cal paint­ing works of Sir Sobha Singh, Kir­pal Singh and other west­ern paint­ings and con­scious of the fact that the face of the Gu­rus is not to be por­trayed in def­er­ence to the true spirit of Shabad Guru of Sikhism, Chaman­deep Singh has ren­dered a paint­ing of how Bhai Jaita Ji, in a very car­ing, lov­ing, de­vout and dis­ci­plined yet bold man­ner took the Sees -head of the Guru to Anand­pur Sahib. 

Trav­el­ling through thick and thin, Bhai Jaita Ji reached Anand­pur Sahib and placed the Sees -head at the feet of the child Guru- Gob­ind Rai, who even­tu­ally was the Tenth Mas­ter Guru Gob­ind Singh. 

Chaman­deep Singh has done many dig­i­tal paint­ings, in­clud­ing the paint­ing of the four mar­tyrs of Saka Nako­dar 1986.

“I hope Guru Sahib and my com­mu­nity ac­cepts my hum­ble Sewa through art.  In the com­ing  years, I pro­pose to paint Bhai Jaita Ji plac­ing Guru Sahib’s Sees-head, with Guru Gob­ind Singh and the re­mark­able brav­ery of Bhai Lakhi Shah Van­jara.”

Chaman­deep Singh Ba­tra, Dig­i­tal Artist

Speak­ing to The World Sikh News, Chaman­deep Singh Ba­tra said, “This is my hum­ble trib­ute to Guru Sahib’s con­tri­bu­tion to re­spect for hu­man rights at a time when the con­cept of hu­man rights as we un­der­stand to­day is yet to evolve.”

“I hope Guru Sahib and my com­mu­nity ac­cepts my hum­ble Sewa through art.  In the com­ing  years, I pro­pose to paint Bhai Jaita Ji plac­ing Guru Sahib’s Sees-head, with Guru Gob­ind Singh and the re­mark­able brav­ery of Bhai Lakhi Shah Van­jara.”

His­tory records that when the Ninth Mas­ter -Guru Tegh Ba­hadur was be­headed in the fore­ground of Del­hi’s Chandni Chowk in 1675, two valiant Sikhs, risk­ing their lives made a dar­ing at­tempt to get hold of the head­less body and the head of the mar­tyr-Guru, from the en­trap­ment of the Mughal se­cu­rity men who were sur­round­ing the place and keep­ing on­look­ers at bay. 

Soon af­ter the mar­tyr­dom, there was a wave of anger on the ground, the sky was red with anger and there was a thun­der­storm as if na­ture was re­act­ing to the in­hu­man and ir­rev­er­ent killing of the Guru. Bhai Gur­das Ji in his Vaars has also recorded this sce­nario in great de­tail. Tak­ing ad­van­tage of the sce­nario, a de­vout Sikh -Bhai Jaita Ji, boldly en­tered the se­cu­rity ring and took away the head of the Ninth Mas­ter Guru Tegh Ba­hadur.  

The head­less body was taken by Bhai Lakhi Shah Van­jara, who cre­mated the body by burn­ing down his house, where to­day stands Gur­d­wara Rak­ab­ganj Sahib, op­po­site the Par­lia­ment House of In­dia.

When Bhai Jaita Ji, rechris­tened Bhai Ji­van Singh af­ter tak­ing Khande-ki-Pahul -the Sikh ini­ti­a­tion, at the hands of the Tenth Mas­ter -Guru Gob­ind Singh, brought the sev­ered head of Guru Tegh Ba­hadur from Delhi where he was ex­e­cuted un­der the or­ders of Mughal In­dia em­peror Au­rangzeb, he was given the ep­i­thet “Rang­hareta Guru ka Beta -the beloved son of Guru Gob­ind Singh.”

Ac­cord­ing to the En­cy­clo­pe­dia of Sikhism by Har­bans Singh, “Bhai Ji­van Singh fell a mar­tyr in the bat­tle of Chamkaur on 7 De­cem­ber 1705. A Burj or a tower stands on the site as a mon­u­ment to his mem­ory.”

When Bhai Jaita Ji, rechris­tened Bhai Ji­van Singh af­ter tak­ing Khande-ki-Pahul -the Sikh ini­ti­a­tion, at the hands of the Tenth Mas­ter -Guru Gob­ind Singh, brought the sev­ered head of Guru Tegh Ba­hadur from Delhi where he was ex­e­cuted un­der the or­ders of Mughal In­dia em­peror Au­rangzeb, he was given the ep­i­thet “Rang­hareta Guru ka Beta -the beloved son of Guru Gob­ind Singh.”

Sig­nif­i­cantly, there is a new twist about the route taken by Bhai Jaita Ji while tra­vers­ing through jun­gles as por­trayed by the young artist. One the­ory that ap­pears more au­then­tic is that he trav­elled through Bagh­pat, around 40 km from Delhi in pre­sent-day Ut­tar Pradesh, whereas the Haryana gov­ern­ment would like us to be­lieve that the first halt was at Badh Khalsa vil­lage near Soni­pat. 

Like in many other cases which are un­clear, his­to­ri­ans can con­tinue their re­search, but for the de­vout, it suf­fices to say that it was the re­mark­able con­tri­bu­tion of Bhai Jaita Ji to take the head of Guru Tegh Ba­hadur Sahib to the Tenth Mas­ter Guru Gob­ind Singh.