|
(1890 A.D - 1940 A.D )
After the decline of Sarkar Khalsa in
1850's, Khalsa population dwindeled
very fast. There were over 1.5 million
Sikhs when Ranjit Singh was ruling (1830's)
but in the first survey conducted by
British they found Sikhs to be numbered
approximately 780,000 in Punjab. This
survey furthers reiterates that Sikh
numbers have gone down due to people
being assimiliating into Hinduism. Those
people who became khalsa during Ranjit
Singh's time to take advantage through
him, now left Khalsa. Hindu reform movements
led by many reformists like Arya Samajis,
etc all over India and Punjab were striking
hard and zealously working to cut the
numbers of Khalsa.
Dayanand, a Baniya Swami from Gujrat
launched a movement called ARYA SAMAJ,
which shunned Idol Worship but mocked
Guru Nanak and Guru Gobind singh. Dayanand's
ideals could be summed up in few words.
Idol Woship is bad.
Hindi is the only language of everyone
in India.
Muslims can be converted to hindusim
after Shuddhi rite.
Only way to worship is through old "Aryan"
ways of Havan
Widows can be married.
Marriage between different castes is
OK.
Even though many of these ideals are
good and are in consistent with Sikhism.
Dayanand made a grave mistake when he
criticized Guru Nanak by calling him
"a Fool". Anyway, Arya Samaj
was only successful in Punjab where
many Punjabi Hindus converted to Arya
Samaj. Thus sowing the seeds of future
confrontation.
Movements like Arya Samaj only helped
Sikhs to reaffirm their values. Maharaja
Rajinder Singh of Patiala on September
7, 1890. In the address presented to
the Maharaja, it said:
In peacetime, the Sikhs mostly are
land-cultivators and artisans—
poor men for the most part—and
the light of western education and civilization
has not reached them in their remote
and ignorant villages. Lethargy has
fallen upon the people. The beginnings
of disintegration threaten. The religious
faith in the Timeless God, once received
with enthusiasm from the great Nanak
and the sacred Gurus who followed him,
is no longer the sustaining power it
was. Even the few Khalsa students who
come forth from the recognized
colleges of the Punjab exhibit a tendency
to despise and abandon the religious
and civil traditions of their fathers,
instead of becoming patriotic leaders
to guide their people to higher planes
of enlightened usefulness. The great
educational institutions of the Province
provide culture for "leisured"
and well-to-do subjects of the Crown,
and show even the less-favoured youth
among Hindus and Mohammadansthe way
to emoluments in Government's services,
at the
Bar, and elsewhere. It is owing, however,
to no want of energy on the part of
the Sikhs that they have failed more
largely to take advantage of these institutions,
as may be seen from their readiness
to join board and indigenous schools
near their homes; but partly because
of their traditionary surroundings (mainly
agricultural), and partly because of
their poverty, Sikh boys have hitherto
found little opportunity for joining
the larger schools and colleges, thus
working their way to intellectual, moral
and material advancement. The result
is that the Sikh community is very poorly
represented in the learned profession;
and in posts of honour and responsibility
in the civil administration. Sikhs now
serving in the British army see their
sons left in their native villages,
far from the tide of civilization, which
is being taken at the flood by the rising
generation of other communities.Besides
this the purely secular education imparted
in public schools is calculated, under
existing circumstances, to slowly obliterate
the distinctive characteristics of the
Sikhs, to check the development of the
qualities which enabled them to attain
to a proud position, and to merge
them finally in the general mass of
the surrounding population.
Thus, by 1890's Sikh effort was to create
institutions which will strengthen Sikhism.
Efforts were at last succeeded when
decision to create the first Institution
of Sikhs, Khalsa college Amritsar was
agreed upon by all parties. Sir James
Lyall, Governor of Punjab was invited
to put the foundation-stone of the Khalsa
College on March 5,1892. The teaching
started with the opening on October
22, 1893, of middle school classes.
This is how the report describes the
inaugural ceremonies:
The Khalsa School was opened on the
22nd October at Amritsar in the late
Pandit Bihari Lal's house near the Hall
Gate. The religious part of the opening
ceremony was conducted a day earlier
in the spacious Hall of the school premises,
with great enthusiasm. Asa-diVar and
other sacred
hymns were sung by a selected body of
trained musicians, and karahprasad was
freely distributed. There was a very
large gathering of native gentlemen
present on the occasion, and they all
rose to offer prayers to the Timeless
God and
to ask Him to grant prosperity to the
new institution. After the ceremony
was over, a procession was formed of
those present, and the whole gathering
consisting of about one thousand gentlemen
moved, singing hymns, to the Town
Hall where a public meeting was already
arranged for. The spacious Hall was
full, and many had to remain standing
in the verandah and on the road.
The Singh Sabha movement made a deep
impact on Sikh psyche. Sikhs understood
that need of the hour was to protect
their identity. Khalsa now was facing
a different kind of threat, earlier
Khalsa had faced military and persecution
threat against its beliefs by Mughals.
Now the threats were at the core beliefs
of Khalsa, against Punjabi language,
against Guru Nanak, against right to
keep hair. Singh Sabha urged the Sikh
youth to come back to Sikh ideals. Youth
leaders like Kartar Singh Jhabbar used
to preach in rural Punjab to stop Sikh
youths from Drinking alcohol, and other
wrong activities. Stimulated by the
Singh Sabha preaching, the Sikh youth
began to assemble for religious discussion
. In 1891 was formed what came to be
called the Khalsa Vidyarthi Sabha or
the Sikh Students Club. This association
of Sikh young men, the first of its
kind, was established at Amritsar on
the initiative of Dr Sundar Singh Sodhbans.
The Sabha used to congregate every Saturday.
The members would thereafter go to the
Harimandir and circumambulate the sacred
pool chanting hymns from the Guru Granth.
They set up special programmes to mark
the anniversaries connected with the
lives of the Gurus. But Golden Temple
management least appreciated their fervour.
On the occasion of their annual meeting
in September 1893, the students set
out from Bunga Mananwalian reciting
holy songs. They first went to the Akal
Takht to offer ardas, but Bhai Multana
Singh Ardasia refused to lead the prayer
for them. He rejected the request for
the reason that the young men were in
sympathy with the Singh Sabha and had
written in a local newspaper disparagingly
about the Golden Temple priests.
Singh Sabha started a movement to free
gurdwaras from the control of hereditory
mahants. The Mahants were not only harassing
the pilgrims but also going against
the basic philosophy of Sikhism. Smoking,
Idol Worshipping, drinking, abuse, etc
was common at these pilgrims center
under the influence of these mahants.
Singh Sabha declared to free these gurdwaras
through non-violent means. By 1928 almost
all the Gurdwaras in Punjab were freed
from the control of Mahants, more than
5000 Sikhs were martyred by these mahants,
directly or indirectly. At Nankana Sahib
Gurdwara , Mahant Narain Das, hired
mercenaries to fire indiscriminate at
the group of Singh Sabha members who
had come to take control of the Gurdwara,
about 200 were killed by firing, rest
were burned alive by the mahant. Later
he was punished by British government.
The affirmation in Sikh values played
a great role in this period of 1890's
to 1930's when Sikhs turned back to
Khalsa and basic philosophy of Sikhism.
Shiromani Gurdwara Prabhandak Committee
was established, which elected its officers
to administer the gurdwaras all over
Punjab and many other parts of country.
Akali party later came out of Singh
Sabha movement.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Copyright © Harbans Singh "The
Heritage of the Sikhs".
|
