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At Guru-ka-Bagh, twenty
kilometres from Amritsar, Sikhs' capacity
for suffering and resistance was put
to further trial after freeing many
Gurdwaras through peaceful resistance.
Sundar Das, the mahant, had by mutual
negotiations made over the shrine to
the Shiromani Committee, taken the Sikh
baptism and parted with his mistresses
except one whom he honourably married.
But he later repudiated part of the
agreement, saying that, though he had
surrendered the gurdwara to the Shiromani
Committee, the piece of land known as
Guru-ka-Bagh attached to it was still
his property. He objected to Sikhs cutting
down trees on that land for the langar.
The police, willing to oblige him, arrested
on August 9, 1922, five Sikhs on charges
of trespass. These arrests were made
not on Sundar Das' complaint, but on
a confidential report received by the
police. The following day, the arrested
Sikhs were hurriedly tried and sentenced
to six months' rigorous imprisonment.
Undeterred by this action of the government,
Sikhs continued the old practice of
hewing wood from Guru-ka-Bagh for the
daily requirements of the community
kitchen. The process of arrests and
convictions proving of little avail,
police tried a new technique to terrorize
the reformers. Those who came to cut
firewood from Guru-ka-Bagh were beaten
up in a merciless manner until they
lay senseless on the ground. They were
dragged about by their hair and left
contemptuously off when the police thought
they had been served well enough. The
Sikhs sutfered all this stoically and
went in larger numbers day by day to
submit themselves to the beating. From
August 31, the number was raised to
100. Every day a batch of one hundred
volunteers would start from the Akal
Takht pledged to suffer their fate silently.
The police would stop them on the way
and smite them with heavy brass-bound
sticks and rifle-butts. The belabouring
continued until the batch lay prostrate
to a man. The Sikhs displayed unique
powers of self-control and resolution,
and bore the bodily torment in a spirit
of complete resignation. None of them
winced or raised his hand.
The Rev. C.F. Andrews, who visited
Amritsar, gave a graphic description
of the passive resistance of the Akalis
in the account he wrote.
He said, ". . .when I reached
the Gurdwara (at Guru-ka-Bagh) itself,
I was struck at once by the absence
of excitement such as I had
expected to find among so great a crowd
of people..."
"Close to the entrance there
was a reader of the Scriptures who was
holding a very large congregation of
worshippers silent as they were seated
on the ground before him. In another
quarter there were attendants who were
preparing the simple evening meal for
the Gurdwara guests by grinding the
flour between two large stones. There
was no sign that the actual beating
had just begun and that the sufferers
had already endured the shower of blows.
But when I asked one of the passers
by, he told me that the beating was
now taking place. On hearing this news,
I at once
went forward. There were some hundreds
present seated on an open piece of ground
watching what was going on in front,
their faces strained with agony. I watched
their faces first of all, before I turned
the corner of a building and reached
a spot where I could see the beating
itself. There was not a cry raised from
the spectators, but the lips of very
many of them were moving in prayer....."
"... There were four Akali Sikhs
with their black turbansfacing a band
of about a dozen policemen, including
two English of ficers. They had walked
slowly up to the line of the police
just before I had arrived and they were
standing silently in front of them at
about a yard's distance. They were perfectly
still and did not move further forward.
Their hands were placed together in
prayer and it was clear that they were
praying. Then without the slightest
provocation on their part, an Englishman
lunged forward the head of his lathi
(staff) which
was bound with brass. He lunged it forward
in such a way that his fist which held
the staff struck the Akali Sikh, who
was praying, just at the collar-bone
with great force. It looked the most
cowardly blow as I saw it struck...."
"The blow which I saw was sufficient
to fell the Akali Sikh and send him
to the ground. He rolled over, and slowly
got up once more, and faced the same
punishment over again. Time after time
one of the four who had gone forward
was laid
prostrate by repeated blows, now from
the English officer and now from the
police who were under his control .
The others were knocked out more quickly.
On this and on subsequent occasions
the police committed certain acts which
were brutal
in the extreme. I saw with my own eyes
one of these police kick in the stomach
of a Sikh who stood helplessly before
him. It was a blow so foul that I could
hardly restrain myself from crying out
aloud and rushing forward. But later
on I was to see another act which was,
if anything, even fouler still. For
when one of the Akali Sikhs had been
hurled to the ground and was lying prostrate,
a police sepoy stamped with his foot
upon him, using his full weight; the
foot struck the prostrate man between
the neck and the should..."
"The brutality and inhumanity
of the whole scene
was indescribably increased by the fact
that the men who were hit were praying
to God and had already taken a vow that
they would remain silent and peaceful
in word and deed...."
"There has been something far
greater in this event than a mere dispute
about land and property. It has gone
far beyond the technical questions of
legal possession or distraint. A new
heroism, learnt through suffering, has
arisen in the land. A new lesson in
moral warfare has been taught to the
world...."
"One thing I have not mentioned
which was significant of all that I
have written concerning the spirit of
the suffering endured. It was very rarely
that I witnessed any Akali Singh, who
went forward to suffer, finch from a
blow when it was
struck. Apart from the instinctive and
involuntary reaction of the muscles
that has the appearance of a slight
shrinking back, there was nothing, so
far as I can remember, that could be
called a deliberate avoidance of the
blows struck. The blows were received
one by one without resistance and
without a sign of fear." The Governor
of the Punjab visited Amritsar on September
13, 1922, and stopped the beating of
Sikh volunteers. Arrests began to be
made instead. At the government announcement
that preparations were being made to
accommodate ten thousand Akalis in gaols,
the Sikhs stepped up their campaigm.
Jathas grew larger in size. The government
at last gave in. The offices of Sir
Ganga Ram, a rich and influential citizen
of Lahores were secured. On November
16, 1922, he obtained the Guru-ka-Bagh
land on lease from the mahant and wrote
to government that he required no police
protection. The government had the excuse
not to interfere with the Sikhs who
could now go unmolested to Guru-ka-Bagh
to cut wood in the jungle. The Sikhs'
gain was not confined merely to the
immediate point involved. The moral
implication of the issue was far more
important.
But the Sikh's trials were not ended.
For protesting against the deposition
of the Sikh Maharaja of Nabha, known
for his sympathy with the Akalis andother
nationalist elements, the Shiromani
Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee was, on
October 13, 1923, declared an unlawful
organization. Next morcha (front) in
this war was Gurdwara Jaito at Nabha.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Copyright © Harbans Singh "The
encyclopedia of Sikhism. "
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