A dialogue with the falling Mangat Gurdwara, Pakistan I still remember the vibrancy of the community in the pre-partition days. Those were the days! I recall year 1604, when the fifth Nanak (Guru Arjan Dev) deputed Bhai Banno to get the first recension of the Guru Granth Sahib (the Sikh...
“Sardar ji, welcome. After a long time a Sikh has visited this mausoleum. Here Baba Nanak had spent some time,” a mystic, dressed in an all-black attire stated at the shrine of Hazrat Shah Shams Tabrez in Multan. Paying my respects at the inner sanctum, as I viewed the frescos...
While we were inside Baba Farid’s shrine, a man asked, “Sardar ji, have you visited Nanak Tibba, the place where Baba Nanak had stayed to compile the verses of Baba Farid?” Guru Nanak had stayed with Baba Ibrahim Farid Sani at Nanak Tibba village to collate the verses of Baba...
The spirit of pluralism, represented by Baba Nanak’s simple words, I witnessed in practice at the Dera Sahib, Pakistan I thereafter proceeded to the sanctum sanctorum to join a sparse congregation and was ecstatic to see shabads (hymns) being sung by a group comprising of a Hindu and two Muslim...
Close to the Radcliffe line in Pakistan —– Feeling you grasp for breath, I heard Kabir resonate in your collapsing walls, WEEP NOT AT DEATH, NOTHING IS PERMANENT. WHATEVER CREATED, SHALL PERISH. For seven decades, we the vestiges have beckoned the descendants of our creators; infuse us again with life;...
Sikh fresco art on the walls of dying monuments across Pakistan speak volumes about the past glory of the region; a highly evolved and respectful society, where women were no less than men! A woman leads a hunt in this 19th century fresco on a dilapidated gurdwara wall in central...
Walking the streets of Sahiwal (Pakistan), I spotted a domed building, distinctively looking like a gurdwara but adorned with a copper, triangular pennant, indicating it would be a Hindu temple. “Hindu Satsang Sabha” was written on its dome in Hindi but at its entrance a plaque engraved in Gurmukhi,...
In the outskirts of the city of Mansehra in Pakistan, I stopped at the grave of Isher Singh, who having adopted Islam in the partition of 1947, is now buried here as Gulam Sarwar. Why Isher Singh stayed back and converted, by will or force, is not of concern to...
At Qila Jiwan Singh (Pakistan), a village named after a Sikh; I looked towards Sarai Amanat Khan (India), a village named after a Muslim. Being served tea at Qila Jiwan Singh by Rafaqat Ali, whose parents had moved from Sarai Amanat Khan in the partition of 1947; it felt that...
At the Indo-Pak border, standing at Ganda Singh Wala (Pakistan), a village named after a Sikh; I looked towards Hussain Wala (India), a village named after a Muslim. Twenty kilometers behind me was Kasur in Pakistan, the town of Baba Bullhe Shah and ahead of me was Faridkot in India,...
