300 years ago, on 3 May 1718 Jassa Singh Ahlu­valia was born, who rose to be­come the Sikh na­tion’s Sov­er­eign as leader of the Dal Khalsa, es­tab­lish­ing the king­dom of Pun­jab. WSN salutes the Sov­er­eign of the Khalsa through this im­pec­ca­ble trib­ute by scholar and thinker Harinder Singh who tran­scre­ates the story of Jassa Singh as nar­rated by Ratan Singh Bhangu in Sri Guru Panth Prakash. WSN awaits com­mem­o­ra­tion of this glo­ri­ous his­tory by Sikh bod­ies es­pous­ing cause of Sikh free­dom.

On 3 May 1718, a leader of the Dal Khalsa was born who es­tab­lished an in­de­pen­dent king­dom in the Pan­jab. In this era, every Sikh head had a bounty on it: hunt and kill!

Jassa Singh Ahlu­valia (pop­u­larly Ahluwalia) was his name, his nanke (ma­ter­nal) and dadke (pa­ter­nal) were strong Sikhs in­spired by Guru Gob­ind Singh Sahib. But it was his moth­er’s in­tel­lect and faith which Jas­sa’s life was mod­eled on, and no his-story records her name.

Ratan Singh Bhangu in Sri Guru Panth Parkash, de­voted a chap­ter on the “Story of Jassa Singh” sub­ti­tled “Jassa Singh Kalal to be known as Shah.” Here’s my trans-cre­ation of the en­tire story where Bhangu in­tro­duces Jassa Singh: 

Now I tell the story of Jassa Singh. He joined the Khalsa (Sov­er­eign who be­longs to the Guru) as a beg­gar, but rose to be the Pan­th’s Sov­er­eign.

A com­mu­nity known as Ahlu­valia lived be­tween La­hore and Ka­sur. There lived one poor Kalal (al­co­hol dis­tillers and sell­ers clas­si­fied as so-called low castes) who was a dear Singh (ini­ti­ated Sikh who join the Khalsa col­lec­tive) of the Guru. His name was Dyal Singh who per­formed odd jobs. He died, leav­ing his wife and son who both loved each other greatly. She was a daugh­ter of the Singh whose fa­ther taught her [Gur­mukhi] al­pha­bets. She knew a lot of Gur­bani (Guru Granth Sahib) by heart, she had a Sikh back­ground from both sides (pa­ter­nal and ma­ter­nal). She al­ways car­ried pothi (se­lec­tions from Guru Granth Sahib in a book-form) in a gatra (strap around shoul­der or belt around waste, nor­mally to don kir­pan-sword). She would go to the Sikh san­gat (con­gre­ga­tion). In the morn­ing, she would per­form caunki (lit­er­ally quar­tet, pop­u­larly chaunki; singing of Asa-ki-Var daily morn­ing col­lec­tive bani-prayer); at dusk, she would re­cite So­dar (‘That [Di­vine] Door’ daily evening bani-prayer).

“Jassa Singh con­vinced the Khalsa to fight back since “there was no ques­tion of sur­ren­der­ing for the Khalsa does not sur­ren­der to any other au­thor­ity ex­cept that of the Guru.””

While hold­ing a dou­ble-stringed in­stru­ment and lov­ing the child as a votary, she would per­form caunki twice a day – this was her daily rou­tine!

Wher­ever the Sikh san­gats as­sem­bled and whoso­ever in­vited her, she never de­clined. Day or night, she would reach, per­form caunki to re­cite Sabad (In­fi­nite Wis­dom from Guru Granth Sahib). On every fes­ti­val, she would go to the Gur­d­uara (Sikh place of learn­ing and wor­ship); she never ne­glected Gu­ru’s work. Wher­ever the Khalsa held Di­van-Court, she would go and sing sabad caunki. She heard the Khalsa came to Am­rit­sar, she also went for the Pan­th’s darsan (glimpse). She lov­ingly per­formed caunki, the Panth lis­tened and felt great peace. The Panth was very happy with her, an aus­pi­cious mo­ment had ar­rived then. Ka­pur Singh called the child; the Singhs them­selves ad­min­is­tered Am­rit (‘Im­mor­tal’ ini­ti­a­tion).

His mother was very happy, she handed him over. He was feel­ing the good for­tune, he be­came pro­tégé of Ni­bab (pop­u­larly Nawab or ‘ruler’ Ka­pur Singh; this is how it ap­pears in orig­i­nal text).  

Ni­bab was kind to Jassa Singh and made him in-charge of horse feed. He per­formed the duty for sev­eral days; the peo­ple of­ten made the child cry. Chil­dren’s strength is in their cry; he came cry­ing to Ka­pur Singh. ‘I can’t dis­trib­ute the feed, many se­verely thrash me.’ Feel­ing happy, Nawab called him near and placed a hand on his spe­cial head. With love his mouth re­marked: ‘You will dis­pense feed to a herd of thou­sands. The Panth made me only a Nawab, they will en­ti­tle you to be a Sov­er­eign.’ At that mo­ment he felt the joy, Jassa Singh Kalal came to be known as Shah (King).

Rat­tan Singh wrote the story as he heard it from the wise ones. In recog­ni­tion of my ser­vices, for­give my lapses.

1722-1739

In 1722, when Jassa Singh was four years old, his fa­ther died. His mother along with him moved to Delhi to serve the Sikh san­gat. While in Delhi, Jassa learned his­tory, re­li­gion, Per­sian, and Hin­dus­tani (lan­guage spo­ken in what is now North­ern In­dia and Pak­istan; it is also known as Hin­davi, Dehlavi, Hindi-Urdu, or Rekhta). They served Mata Sun­dari, wife of Guru Gob­ind Singh Sahib, for seven years be­fore com­ing back to the Pan­jab. Mata Sun­dari gifted Jassa Singh a sword, a mace, a shield, a bow and a quiver full of ar­rows, a dress and a sil­ver staff.

From 1729 on­wards at Kar­tarpur, Jassa Singh was un­der the men­tor­ship of Nawab Ka­pur Singh. Jassa Singh was trained to serve the Panth: con­tin­ued learn­ing sabad and started horse-rid­ing and weaponry (sword, spear, bow and ar­row, and so on). While fel­low Sikhs made fun of his Pan­jabi pro­nun­ci­a­tion by ridi­cul­ing him with hamko-tumko, he re­mained fo­cused to be­come part of the Nam Cul­ture: in­ces­sant con­nec­tion with Ik Oankar and ever-ready to ad­min­is­ter jus­tice in the world.

“Within Jassa Singh’s life­time, Sikhs went from run­ning for their lives to in­de­pen­dent land own­ers and their own coun­try. All this within two gen­er­a­tions. This was the legacy of Jassa Singh and his fel­low Sikh lead­ers who led the Panth via Misls and Akal Takht Sahib in the eigh­teenth cen­tury.”

This was the time when em­peror Mo­ham­mad Shah had ap­pointed Za­karia Khan as gov­er­nor for de­clar­ing: “If Your Majesty ap­points me the Gov­er­nor of La­hore, I would elim­i­nate the Sikhs from Ma­jha, Doaba, and Malva” re­gions of the Pan­jab. Awards were de­clared on Sikh heads and a geno­ci­dal cam­paign against the Sikhs started. Thou­sands were killed, many took refuge on the banks of river Ravi, Kah­nu­van and Lakhi jun­gles, Shiv­a­lik Hills, and in Bikaner. The Khalsa or­ga­nized it­self into two Dals (groups): Budha (se­nior) Dal and Taruna (young) Dal.

In 1730, Sar­bat Khalsa (Col­lec­tive Sov­er­eign de­lib­er­a­tions) un­der the lead­er­ship of Bhai Mani Singh re-or­ga­nized the Taruna Dal into five units to deal with far tar­gets and cam­paigns in li­ai­son with Budha Dal headed by Ka­pur Singh. Jassa Singh, though young, re­mained with Ka­pur Singh as his per­sonal as­sis­tant. And they raised havoc for the Delhi and La­hore ad­min­is­tra­tion for the next six years and forced them to of­fer a peace deal.

In 1736, via Sar­bat Khalsa Ka­pur Singh be­comes Nawab of a prin­ci­pal­ity near Am­rit­sar where the Khalsa was free to op­er­ate; it in­cluded Chuhrian, Day­alpur, Kana­gan­val, and Chab­bal. Lead­ing Sikhs stayed in Am­rit­sar from here on­wards.

Dr. Ganda Singh in Sar­dar Jassa Singh Ahluwalia pro­vides the con­text for “The Be­gin­ning of the Achieve­ments of S. Jassa Singh” in the chap­ter en­ti­tled “Nawab Jassa Singh, The Leader of the Sikh Panth”:

Dur­ing the times of Abud-Samad Khan, Za­kria Khan, Yahya Khan and Mir Mannu when­ever the Singhs looted a royal trea­sure, a pri­vate car­a­van or a vil­lage or made a forcible tax col­lec­tion, their aim was to arrange for food and other pro­vi­sions to spend their days in the hill caves and deserts to weaken the Mus­lim rulers through guer­rilla tac­tics and at­tacks so that the coun­try could be lib­er­ated from their rule. Up to the time of Mannu, the Mughal power was so for­mi­da­ble that it was not pos­si­ble to break it with­out ef­fec­tive weapons-and arms and am­mu­ni­tion in good quan­ti­ties. But even then, the Singhs were able to main­tain their en­thu­si­asm and their de­ter­mi­na­tion to carve out an in­de­pen­dent Sikh State, and in the process, they won the pub­lic sym­pa­thy. The or­di­nary Sikhs were pass­ing through hard times and were mak­ing heavy sac­ri­fices. The dream of the Khalsa Raj had been re­alised, though for a short pe­riod, by Banda Singh Ba­hadur, and this was a source of great in­spi­ra­tion for the Singhs. There­fore, when af­ter the death of Mir Mannu, the Singhs re­turned from the jun­gles and hills to their vil­lages, large or­gan­i­sa­tions of the vil­lage Gur­mukh Singhs wel­comed them. This en­abled the Khalsa not only to es­tab­lish its con­trol over Pun­jab, but also made it pos­si­ble for the Singhs to re­sist the for­eign in­vaders like Ahmed Shah Dur­rani, and his son Tehmur Shah com­ing from the side of Afghanistan for loot and plun­der. The po­si­tion of the Singhs had be­come so strong that they not only re­pulsed the for­eign in­vaders but they also helped the Jat kings of Bharat­pur and frus­trated the Maratha de­signs to es­tab­lish their con­trol over Pun­jab. More­over, they be­gan to in­vade the neigh­bour­ing ter­ri­tory to fur­ther strengthen their po­si­tion po­lit­i­cally and eco­nom­i­cally.

(In the afore­said con­text of Banda Singh Ba­hadur’s Khalsa Raj pe­riod (1710-1716), Gur­mukh-Singh’s term was used for Sikh farm­ers or traders whereas the Singhs were the war­riors.)

1739-1753

Jassa Singh ei­ther wit­nessed or par­tic­i­pated in: Dal Khalsa help­ing Phulkian Sar­dars (chiefs) ex­pand their ter­ri­to­ries; Za­karia Khan con­fis­cat­ing ja­gir (land) and re­strict­ing ac­cess to Am­rit­sar; mar­tyr­doms of Bhai Mani Singh and Bhai Taru Singh; killing of Massa Rang­har by Sukha Singh and Mehtab Singh for des­e­crat­ing Sri Ha­ri­man­dar Sahib and Akal Takht Sahib com­plex; charg­ing of toll tax by Bota Singh and Garja Singh to show Sikhs are alive; de­feat­ing Mur­taza Khan who sup­plied cen­tral Asian horses to the em­peror; the Khalsa snatch­ing plun­der of the in­vader Nadir Shah who was re­turn­ing tri­umphant from Delhi; and geno­ci­dal cam­paigns to elim­i­nate Sikhs by Za­karia Khan, Yahuiya Khan, Lakh­pat Rai and Jas­pat Rai.

In 1746, the Chota Ghal­lughara was or­dered by Yahya Khan and im­ple­mented by Lakh­pat Rai. 15,000 Sikhs were sur­rounded in Kah­nu­van. Jassa Singh con­vinced the Khalsa to fight back since “there was no ques­tion of sur­ren­der­ing for the Khalsa does not sur­ren­der to any other au­thor­ity ex­cept that of the Guru.” About 7,000 Sikhs were killed; 3,000 cap­tured. All of them were tor­tured to death in the horse mar­ket near Delhi gate, La­hore; Sikhs termed this place Shahid-Ganj. Jassa Singh and sev­eral other sur­vived and re­grouped within six months.

In 1747, Jassa Singh along with Nawab Ka­pur Singh, Tara Singh Vain, and Chuhar Singh Bhakian es­tab­lished their con­trol over Am­rit­sar af­ter de­feat­ing Sla­bat Khan. Am­rit­sar be­came the rally point and re­sis­tance cen­ter. In 1748, Ah­mad Shah Dur­rani (aka Ab­dali) in­vaded Pan­jab. Jassa Singh and Nawab Ka­pur Singh caused him much ha­rass­ment at Nur-di-Sarai and Vairoval. Sar­bat Khalsa con­vened on Vaisakhi day to con­sol­i­date the sixty-five Jathas into one mil­i­tary com­mand to ad­dress the con­tin­u­ous per­se­cu­tion by the rul­ing Mughal au­thor­i­ties. They se­lected Jassa Singh as the com­man­der of 11 Misls (states); the twelfth Misl Phulkian traced a sep­a­rate ori­gin.  Misls acted in uni­son and were sub­ject to Gur­matas (Gu­ru’s res­o­lu­tions) via Sar­bat Khalsa process, bind­ing to all. Jassa Singh ini­ti­ated Ram Rauni, a fortress com­pound named af­ter Guru Ra­madas Sahib.

“How are the self-iden­ti­fied sov­er­eign­tists go­ing to em­power the Panth with­out gur­bani and khande-ki-pahul?”

Be­tween 1748-53, Jassa Singh wit­nessed the reign of re­pres­sion by Mir Mannu, Gov­er­nor of La­hore, to elim­i­nate the Sikhs yet again. Amidst com­plex sce­nario, Jassa Singh di­a­logued, bat­tled and ne­go­ti­ated with Ad­ina Begh, Ad­min­is­tra­tor of Doaba; and sup­ported Di­van Kaura Mall of Mul­tan to seek help for the Sikhs. It worked and ren­o­va­tions at Ha­ri­man­dar Sahib, Am­rit­sar and Bal-Lila Nankana Sahib were se­cured. All this while Ah­mad Shah Dur­rani kept in­vad­ing the Pan­jab!

In 1753, Nawab Ka­pur Singh be­fore his death in­structed Jassa Singh to free Pan­jab in the name of Guru Gob­ind Singh Sahib by serv­ing the Khalsa. Jassa Singh con­quered Khavspur and Fa­tah­bad; es­tab­lished Rakhi sys­tem of pro­tec­tion in ex­change for rev­enue.

1753-1765

Jassa Singh’s vic­to­ries in­cluded de­feat­ing Shah Nawaz of Mul­tan while help­ing Kaura Mall; Aziz Beg and Bakhinda Khan who at­tacked Am­rit­sar; Ad­ina Beg Khan and Bu­land Khan at Ma­halpur; Saa­dat Khan, Dur­rani’s rep­re­sen­ta­tive at Ja­land­har; Ubaidulla Khan, Dur­rani’s Afghan gen­eral; Hira Mal and Gul­sher Khan; Ja­han Khan, Dur­rani’s out­stand­ing gen­eral; Ubaid Khan with Charat Singh Suckar­cakia, Ran­jit Singh’s grand­fa­ther; and Zain Khan at Sarhind. Then on­wards, Dur­rani was on de­fen­sive.

The con­quests started at Khavspur and Fa­tah­bad; sub­se­quently con­quered La­hore and Sarhind.

Ah­mad Shah Dur­rani at­tacked Pan­jab seven times; many a time de­mol­ish­ing Sri Ha­ri­man­dar Sahib and Akal Takht Sahib Com­plex. When Dur­rani heard the fall of La­hore, he has­tened to­wards the Pan­jab. This was in 1762, his sixth in­cur­sion into In­dia. 30,000 Sikhs (men, women, and chil­dren) re­tired to the south of the river Satluj; the car­a­van moved from vil­lage to vil­lage cov­er­ing a cir­cle of sev­eral miles. Dur­rani or­dered all his fau­j­dars (com­man­ders) in the Pan­jab to join forces with Zain Khan, Gov­er­nor of Sarhind. With 150,000 men army, Dur­rani left La­hore and cov­ered 250 km in 36 hours to reach Malerkotla on 5 Feb­ru­ary. The Dal Khalsa camped at Kup, 9 km from Malerkotla to pro­tect the Sikhs. In what fol­lowed 30,000 Sikhs were killed. All Sar­dars (Misl chiefs) re­ceived 5-7 wounds, Jassa Singh sus­tained 22 wounds on his body.  Bhangu’s Sri Guru Panth Prakash on “here’s story of Ghal­lughara at Malerkotla and Kup” de­scribes how all Sikhs who iden­ti­fied with the Guru, de­fended:

Jassa Singh sus­tained 22 wounds, even then the re­spected Singh con­tin­ued fight­ing.
When they heard Jassa Singh is in­jured, all chiefs shook their head.89
They all came and stood among con­tin­gents: Bhangi, Gha­nia, Ram­garhia,
Nakkais, Nis­han­valias and Dal­l­e­valias, along with Ka­pur Singh of Ahlu­val.90
Sukar­cakia, Sham Singh, Shahid-Ni­hang, other Guru-lovers,
from Am­rit­sar and Anand­pur, Ram­dasie, Ranghrete, and Masands.91
Be­dis, Sod­his, Tre­hans, Bhal­las, joined them­selves with the Khalsa:
They were mar­tyred or in­jured; some­times they paused, some­times they marched to fight.92

“On Jassa Singh’s 300-yr com­mem­o­ra­tions, mis­ap­pro­pri­a­tions are full-on to la­bel him as na­tional hero of In­dia. If any­thing, he trained and fought for the Pan­jab. His legacy was built on chis­el­ing via Guru Granth Sahib and serv­ing the Guru Khalsa Panth. He was, and will re­main, Sul­tan-ul-Qaum, Sov­er­eign of the Sikh Na­tion!”

In Sikh col­lec­tive mem­ory, it is still re­mem­bered as  Vadda Ghal­lughara for the Khalsa had never suf­fered such a heavy loss of life in one day. Yet, sev­eral geno­ci­dal cam­paigns of last 50 years had raised a new gen­er­a­tion of the Khalsa in the shadow of Kir­pan – the Gu­ru’s sword graced to pro­tect honor! In next three years, a Sikh na­tion-state was born in the Pan­jab out of Sar­bat Khalsa de­lib­er­a­tions. An­other crit­i­cal event was in 1764 when Baba Gur­bax Singh along with 30 Sikhs con­fronted 30,000 (18,000 Afghans and 12,000 Balochis un­der Dur­rani) and em­braced mar­tyr­dom de­fend­ing Sri Ha­ri­man­dar Sahib and Akal Takht Sahib Com­plex.

Some no­table Sar­bat Khalsa Gur­matas at Akal Takht Sahib, Am­rit­sar dur­ing this pe­riod:

• In 1756, on Vaisakhi day, Jassa Singh was ap­pointed as the re­li­gious and po­lit­i­cal leader of the Khalsa as Nawab Ka­pur Singh had also as­sumed the re­li­gious leader role af­ter the mar­tyr­dom of Bhai Mani Singh.
• In 1760, on Di­vali day, de­ci­sion to at­tack La­hore.
• In 1761, on Vaisakhi day, de­ci­sion to free Hindu women. Jassa Singh left im­me­di­ately with a vol­un­teer force, caught up with the Afghans at the River Sut­lej at Goind­val, res­cued 2,200 women whom Dur­rani was car­ry­ing as his slaves, and gal­lantly es­corted them to their fam­i­lies.
• In 1761, on Di­vali day, to elim­i­nate the rule of Dur­rani.

In 1765, on Vaisakhi day to cap­ture La­hore. A week later La­hore was oc­cu­pied by the Dal Khalsa and the Gob­ind­shahi coins were struck in 1765 as the for­mal de­c­la­ra­tion of their sov­er­eign sta­tus. The Pan­jab was now free af­ter 750 years.

1765-1783

Jassa Singh and the Dal Khalsa con­sol­i­dated the Pan­jab. Dur­rani’s em­pire was ru­ined. Em­peror Shah Alam cor­re­sponded with Jassa Singh and other Sikh chiefs to se­cure his trans-Ja­muna ter­ri­to­ries. Jassa Singh helped Amar Singh of Pa­tiala by de­feat­ing Ab­dul Ah­mad Khan who re­turned the en­tire trib­ute col­lected from the Sikhs and paid Rs. 700,000 as an in­dem­nity to the Dal Khalsa.

As a leader of the Dal Khalsa, Jassa Singh had or­ga­nized the Sikhs mil­i­tar­ily, over­thrown Afghans, and won the right for Sikhs to rule Pan­jab in­de­pen­dently. Sarhind came un­der Phulkian, La­hore un­der Bhangis, Ja­land­har Doab dis­trib­uted among sev­eral Misls, and Ka­purthala un­der Ahlu­valias.

On 20 Oc­to­ber 1783, Jassa Singh died at the age of 65. At that time, Dal Khalsa was 200,000 Sikhs with 70,000 horses. The rule in­cluded La­hore, Mul­tan, Jammu, Kash­mir, Kan­gra Hills to Delhi; the in­flu­ence was ex­erted to Ganga Doab, Ra­jasthan, and Agra. Baghel Singh con­tin­ued the mis­sion and built eight main Gur­d­uaras in Delhi. Jassa Singh and fel­low Misl lead­ers spent their life­time train­ing, fight­ing, and in diplo­macy; their im­pact was that the Mughals were sup­pressed, the Afghans de­feated and the Pan­jab be­longed to her peo­ple.

Jassa Guru-ka-Lal

In Pan­jabi-Sikh par­lance, Jassa is fa­mous, Guru is Per­fec­tion, Lal is beloved. Hence, Jassa Guru-ka-Lal be­comes “Fa­mous Per­fec­tion’s Beloved.”

Be­sides his lead­er­ship in the mil­i­tary and po­lit­i­cal spheres, Jassa Singh was widely revered for his deeply re­li­gious and pi­ous char­ac­ter. He in­spired many to study Guru Granth Sahib and re­ceive Khande-ki-Pahul (Sikh ini­ti­a­tion to be­come the Khalsa).

Jassa Singh showed strate­gic bold­ness and out­stand­ing gen­er­al­ship. While he con­fronted tyranny, he felt cer­tain of vic­tory too, even when all ap­peared to be lost. His close­ness to the Guru pro­pelled him to ex­cel­lence. Gu­ru’s ideals of fight­ing for jus­tice, not re­venge, stood tall with him. There were no pris­on­ers mur­dered in cold blood; there were no mal­treat­ment of women by his armies. En­emy sol­diers were al­lowed to go free if they laid down their arms. He kept the chiefs loyal to him through his states­man­ship and diplo­macy. He showed ex­ces­sive gen­eros­ity by not adding more ter­ri­to­ries to his Misl and let other Misls take a greater share for the sake of unity. He could have ruled La­hore from 1765 on­wards hav­ing a greater claim to it and even hav­ing con­quered it ear­lier as well, but he chose not to.

Misl chiefs united when Jassa Singh asked, be­cause he had helped them de­feat the in­vaders or Mughals. He re­strained Misl chiefs who were bent on de­stroy­ing Pa­tiala (Sikh Misl friendly with the Afghans) in or­der to unify the Sikhs for a much greater pur­pose. He gained in­flu­ence through close strate­gic re­la­tions with Suraj Mal and Jawa­har Singh by help­ing them against the Ro­hillas, Mughals, Ra­jputs and Marathas.

This was all achieved be­cause the in­de­pen­dent Sikhs came to­gether to an­swer the Guru Khalsa Pan­th’s call! Sikhi strength­ened them in­ter­nally, and their re­sent­ment to au­thor­ity ex­ter­nally brought them to­gether. Misl lead­ers though com­pet­ing against each other dis­played uni­son un­der a sin­gle com­mand of Jassa Singh for he ex­em­pli­fied Miri-Piri (Po­lit­i­cal-Spir­i­tual) doc­trine. He was suc­cess­ful as a Misl leader and as the Pan­th’s leader, re­gard­less of whether he fought alone or jointly.

Within Jassa Singh’s life­time, Sikhs went from run­ning for their lives to in­de­pen­dent land own­ers and their own coun­try. All this within two gen­er­a­tions. This was the legacy of Jassa Singh and his fel­low Sikh lead­ers who led the Panth via Misls and Akal Takht Sahib in the eigh­teenth cen­tury.

Panth To­day

On Jassa Singh’s 300-yr com­mem­o­ra­tions, mis­ap­pro­pri­a­tions are full-on to la­bel him as na­tional hero of In­dia. If any­thing, he trained and fought for the Pan­jab. His legacy was built on chis­el­ing via Guru Granth Sahib and serv­ing the Guru Khalsa Panth. He was, and will re­main, Sul­tan-ul-Qaum, Sov­er­eign of the Sikh Na­tion!

200,000 Sikhs were killed within 70 years of 1699 in­au­gu­ra­tion of the Khalsa of Guru Gob­ind Singh Sahib. Khalsa Raj, two ma­jor Ghal­lugha­ras, mul­ti­ple geno­ci­dal cam­paigns, se­ries of Mughal, Afghan, and Iran­ian in­va­sions of the Pan­jab, yet Sikhs kept or­ga­niz­ing and gov­erned with Sabad-wis­dom and Sar­bat Khalsa process through­out the Dal Khalsa and Misl pe­riod. No Misl chief col­lab­o­rated with hos­tile regimes or in­vaders to set­tle scores with fel­low Misl chief amidst con­stant al­liances be­tween Misls. And they de­clared Sikh Rule in 1765.

We have lot to learn from the eigh­teenth cen­tury Sikhs who in their im­per­fec­tions still de­liv­ered for the Panth, be it as farm­ers, traders or as war­riors.

Are the Ahlu­valias and other Misl-dri­ven Sikhs back to caste-ag­gran­dize­ment or are they ready to be­come Guru-ke-lal?

How are the self-iden­ti­fied sov­er­eign­tists go­ing to em­power the Panth with­out gur­bani and khande-ki-pahul?

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1984 Ghal­lughara was 34 years ago. We are now about halfway mark of the eigh­teenth cen­tury Sikhs jour­ney. Are the 30 mil­lion Sikhs glob­ally ready to train them­selves with sabad caunkis for the next ‘Jas­sa’ Kaur or Singh to lead the Sikhs for col­lec­tive sov­er­eignty in the twenty-first cen­tury?

Im­ages Cour­tesy: Pan­jab Dig­i­tal Li­brary