Baba Gurbakhsh Singh - 2009

Baba GURBAKHSH SINGH Shahid, (1688-1764), hailed from the village of Lil, in Amritsar district. According to an old manu-script which was preserved in the Sikh Refer-ence Library, Amritsar, until it perished in the Army action in 1984, and which is quot-ed by Siñgh Sãhib Giani Kirpal Siñgh, he was born on Baisãkh 10 April 1688 (father Bhãi Dasaundhã, mother Mãi Lachchhami). In 1693, the family shifted to Anandpur where Gurbakhsh Singh took pahul of the Khãlsã on the historic Baisãkhi day of 1699. He completed his religious ed-ucation under Bhãi Mani Siñgh. He later joined the Shahid misl under Bãbã Deep Singh and, after the latter’s death in 1757, orga-nized his own jatha or defensive band. In the battles against the Durrãnis and the Mughals in the eighteenth century, his small group usually formed the vanguard carrying the banner, and won renown for its acts of gallantry. When in November 1764 Ahmad Shah Durrãni, at the head of 30,000 men, invaded India for the seventh time, Bhãi Gurbakhsh Singh was stationed at the holy shrine at Amritsar - (the Golden Temple). The Durrãni advanced up to the town virtually unopposed and entered the partially reconstructed Harimandar, which he had demolished two years earlier. Bhãi Gurbakhsh Singh, who had already evacuated from the precincts women, children and the aged, had with him only thirty men.

According to Ratan Singh Bhangü, Pràchin Panth Prakàsh, “Bhãi Gurbakhsh Singh, with garlands around his neck and sword on his shoulder, dressed himself as a bridegroom, his men forming the marriage party, waiting eagerly to court the bride-death.” As soon as they saw the Afghan king and his hordes, they swooped down upon them. This was an unequal fight - thirty pitted against thirty thousand. All thirty Sikhs were killed before Gurbakhsh Singh, though throughout in the forefront, also fell. Giving an eye-witness account of the action, Qazi Nür Muhammad, the chroni-cler who was in the train of the invader, writes in his Jangnamah:

When the King and his army reached the Chakk (Amritsar), they did not see any [infidel] there. But a few men stay-ing in a fortress were bent upon spilling their blood and they sacrificed themselves for their Guru… They were only 30 in number. They did not have the least fear of death. They engaged the Ghãzis and spilled their blood in the process. Thus all of them were slaughtered and consigned to the seventh [hell].

This happened on 1 December 1764. Bãba Gurbakhsh Singh was cremated behind Takht Akal Bunga. Later, a memorial was built on the site which is now known as Shahid Ganj; the place of martyrs.

Commissioned by Pal Singh - Designed by Paul Blenman