On the oc­ca­sion of the mar­tyr­dom day of Bhai Taru Singh, the spir­i­tu­ally in­clined au­thor Bhupin­der Singh Hous­ton yearns for a rekin­dling of the spirit of Sikhism by keep­ing un­shorn hair and re­main­ing stead­fast to the com­mit­ment to one’s faith as chal­lenges of moder­nity and peer pres­sure dis­suade a sec­tion of the next gen­er­a­tion of the Sikhs away from it.

 A BEAU­TI­FUL POEM IN BEN­GALI BY NO­BEL LAU­RE­ATE POET RA­BINDRANATH TAGORE de­scribes Bhai Taru Singh’s hero­ism, courage and supreme sac­ri­fice. A few gen­er­a­tions back many Ben­galis had read the poem Tagore wrote, and to­day even the Sikhs don’t know about Bhai Taru Singh, de­spite the fact that he gets men­tioned in our daily con­gre­ga­tional Ar­das (prayer). The de­gree of suf­fer­ing that he un­der­went is mind-bog­gling. That is why telling and re­mem­ber­ing the story of Bhai Taru Singh is so im­por­tant if we are to un­der­stand the his­tory of Sikhs.

So, let us start with a tour of the once-walled city of La­hore by choos­ing to head in the op­po­site di­rec­tion of Delhi Gate. There is the Sha­heedganj Gur­d­wara, the place where over 10,000 Sikhs were butchered in a week’s time by the butch­ers of La­hore on the or­ders of the Afghan gov­er­nor Yahya Khan. Their bod­ies were thrown in a nearby well. That well is now known as Sha­heedi Khoo-Well of the mar­tyrs. Near the Sha­heedganj Gur­d­wara is the spot where Bhai Taru Singh was ex­e­cuted on June 09, 1745. The memo­r­ial there is known as Gu­rud­wara Sha­heed Bhai Taru Singh.

BHAI TARU SINGH
When the Pathans brought them chained
All in calm they re­mained
The cap­tive Sikhs -thought at Shahi­gunj town
With the com­rades’ blood the soil was brown
Says the Nawab, “Look Taru Singh
I want to for­give you with­out mis­giv­ing.”
Says Taru, “Why for me so much slight?”
Nawab says, “A great war­rior you are
That you proved in your fight;
So, to you I bear no anger;
Only I beg of you the gift of your Beni*
And you will be spared harm any.”
Taru replied, “I owe you as your mer­cy’s nom­i­nee;
So, of­fer a bit more, my head with my Beni.”*

Po­et’s Note: To shave off re­li­gion is as good as for­sak­ing re­li­gion for a Sikh. *Beni in Ben­gali means the coiled hair the Sikhs keep.

Ra­bindranath Tagore

There is a line from Ar­das where we re­mem­ber those who stood firm in their faith as:

“ਜਿਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਸਿੰਘਾਂ ਸਿੰਘਣੀਆਂ ਨੇ ਧਰਮ ਹੇਤ ਸੀਸ ਦਿਤੇ, ਬੰਦ ਬੰਦ ਕਟਾਏ, ਖੋਪਰੀਆਂ ਲੁਹਾਈਆਂ,……”
Pon­der over the deeds of those brave Sikh men and women who ‘gave’ their heads but did not sur­ren­der their Sikh re­li­gion; who were cut to pieces -limb by limb, who got their scalps re­moved…yet did not re­lin­quish their faith.”

“Ji­naa Sing­haa Singh­neeaa” Is in the re­mem­brance of those who laid down their lives for their faith, as in Sha­heedganj.

“Bandh Bandh Katai” Is in the re­mem­brance of the sac­ri­fice of Bhai Mani Singh.

“Kho­preeaa La­haeeaa” Is in the re­mem­brance of the sac­ri­fice of Bhai Taru Singh.

Bhai Taru Singh was a young farmer in vil­lage Poohla, Am­rit­sar Dis­trict, who was known for pro­vid­ing shel­ter and food to all those who were flee­ing Afghan per­se­cu­tion. In those days the au­thor­i­ties in La­hore had a lot of in­form­ers, and a spy from Jan­di­ala named Akil Das, also called Harb­ha­gat in­formed the gov­er­nor of the Pun­jab -Za­kariya Khan, that Taru and his sis­ter were pro­vid­ing food to Sikh fight­ers hid­ing in a nearby for­est. They were, al­legedly, part of a plot to over­throw the gov­er­nor.

Za­kariya Khan asked, “From where do the Sikhs ob­tain their nour­ish­ment? I have de­barred them from all oc­cu­pa­tions. They re­al­ize no taxes. They do not farm, nor are they al­lowed to do busi­ness or join pub­lic em­ploy­ment. I have stopped all of­fer­ings to their Gur­d­waras, their places of wor­ship. No pro­vi­sions or sup­plies are ac­ces­si­ble to them. Why do they not die of sheer star­va­tion?”

Harb­ha­gat replied; “There are Sikhs in this world, who would not eat un­til they have fed their brethren. They may them­selves go with­out food and cloth­ing but can­not bear their com­rades’ dis­tress. They would pass the win­ter by the fire­side and send them their own clothes. They would sweat to grind corn and have it sent to them. They would do the rough­est chore to earn a small wage for their sake. They mi­grate to dis­tant places to eke out money for their broth­ers in ex­ile.”

“My hair is in­sep­a­ra­ble from my scalp.”

Bhai Taru Singh Ji

Za­kariya Khan de­cided to teach the Sikhs a les­son.

At the or­ders of Za­kariya Khan, both Bhai Taru Singh and his sis­ter were ar­rested and brought to La­hore. His sis­ter was re­leased af­ter vil­lagers raised money for her re­lease, and af­ter promis­ing never again to as­sist strangers.

But Taru Singh, 25 years old, was made of firmer stuff and re­fused to apol­o­gize for feed­ing those in need. He was pre­sented be­fore the gov­er­nor, and he de­fi­antly greeted him with the Sikh salu­ta­tion: “Wa­he­guru Ji ka Khalsa, Wa­he­guru Ji ki Fateh.” On hear­ing these words the gov­er­nor went into a rage and as was the prac­tice he or­dered that Taru ei­ther be­come a Mus­lim or would be pun­ished. If he re­fused to be­come a Mus­lim, he would be ex­e­cuted. Bhai Taru Singh Ji had taken Am­rit -bap­tism to be part of the Khalsa or­der, from Bhai Mani Singh Ji and was re­ally in­spired by him and stirred by his sac­ri­fice in 1737. On hear­ing this he re­torted: ‘Why must I be­come a Mus­lim, do they never die?’

“Even if I were of­fered the king­ship of the whole world and the beau­ties of par­adise, I will not barter my faith.”

Bhai Taru Singh Ji

Next, Za­kariya Khan upped the ante by of­fer­ing a high po­si­tion with the gov­ern­ment and mar­riage with a beau­ti­ful girl from the royal Mughal fam­ily, if he em­braced Is­lam. Bhai Taru Singh re­fused to give up his faith. He told Gov­er­nor Za­kariya Khan, “Even if I were of­fered the king­ship of the whole world and the beau­ties of par­adise, I will not barter my faith.”

The an­swer re­ally dis­mayed Za­kariya Khan and he wanted to find out from where the Sikhs got their firm faith. He was told that it was from their long hair. Za­kariya or­dered that his hair should be cut by force. Bhai Taru Singh was not less de­ter­mined and would not budge. Bhai Taru Singh said, “My hair is in­sep­a­ra­ble from my scalp.” Za­kariya Khan called a cob­bler and or­dered him to cut the scalp of Bhai Taru Singh with his cob­bler’s chisel. Amidst the tor­ture of scalp­ing, Bhai Sahib could only be heard recit­ing Japji Sahib. Af­ter this, he was taken to La­hore Fort and im­pris­oned and tor­tured again to die a slow death.

Dur­ing this time Za­kariya Khan be­came se­ri­ously ill and was un­able to pass urine. His ab­domen swelled up and he was very un­com­fort­able be­cause of in­tense pain. Za­kariya re­al­ized that he was suf­fer­ing be­cause of his atroc­i­ties on the Sikhs. So, he sent a mes­sen­ger, Bhai Subeg Singh to Bhai Taru Singh and asked for his for­give­ness. Bhai Taru Singh was in high spir­its and in a state of bliss de­spite his suf­fer­ings. He for­gave Za­kariya Khan say­ing, “Every­thing hap­pens in God’s Will. I have no ill-will against you. You will have to set­tle your own ac­count in God’s court. Re­mem­ber, you will be there be­fore me.” Af­ter sur­viv­ing for 22 days, the Gov­er­nor died on the 1 July 1745. Bhai Taru Singh gave up his mor­tal body a few hours later af­ter hear­ing about the death of the Gov­er­nor.

“There are Sikhs in this world, who would not eat un­til they have fed their brethren. They may them­selves go with­out food and cloth­ing but can­not bear their com­rades’ dis­tress. They would pass the win­ter by the fire­side and send them their own clothes. They would sweat to grind corn and have it sent to them. They would do the rough­est chore to earn a small wage for their sake. They mi­grate to dis­tant places to eke out money for their broth­ers in ex­ile.”

The Sikh char­ac­ter as de­fined by an in­tel­li­gence of­fi­cer of the Gov­er­nor of Pun­jab Za­kariya Khan

On the oc­ca­sion of his memo­r­ial, we have won­dered about what is go­ing on with us to­day. For Bhai Taru Singh the in­spi­ra­tion of his faith was from the city of Am­rit­sar. He was will­ing to give his life but not his hair.

Let us not for­get our her­itage, and reignite the spirit of faith. Bhai Taru Singh’s sac­ri­fice in­spired Tagore, a thou­sand miles away to pen a poem on his firm faith.

Let us seek “Sikhi daan and Kesh daan” -the gift of Sikhi and Un­shorn hair and may we re­peat our prayers to Guru Ji that we re­main stead­fast to our faith as Bhai Taru Singh and may Guru Sahib be­stow the boon of liv­ing with un­shorn hair – “Sikhi ke­san swasan naal nib­hai.”

Ref­er­ences:
1. Singh, Kar­tar, Dhillon, Gur­dial Singh. Sto­ries from Sikh His­tory, Vol­ume V Hemkunt Press (1987)
2. Singh, Dr. San­tokh. The Gu­ru’s Word & Il­lus­trated Sikh His­tory. Spir­i­tual Awak­en­ing Stud­ies (2000)
3. Neki, Dr. Jaswant Singh. Ar­das: Dar­shan, Roop Te Ab­hias. Singh Broth­ers (1994)
4. https://​www.sikhi­wiki.org/​in­dex.php/​Bhai_­Taru_S­ingh
5. https://​www.dawn.com/​news/​1548469. Hark­ing Back: Tragic Twists in the Legacy of Bhai Taru Singh

An en­gi­neer by pro­fes­sion, hail­ing from Myan­mar, ed­u­cated in In­dia, Bhupin­der Singh is a Hous­ton-based busi­ness­man, with a keen in­ter­est in writ­ing books and ar­ti­cles on Sikh his­tory, mo­ti­va­tion and spir­i­tu­al­ity.