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Warrior

Banda Singh Bahadur

Khalsa commander who took Sirhind

1670—1716

1670–1716 CE

Born Lachhman Dev in the Rajouri hills, he became the bairagi Madho Das, met Guru Gobind Singh at Nanded in 1708 and was sent north as Banda Singh. In 1710 he took Sirhind, struck coins in the name of the Gurus and broke the hold of the Mughal jagirdars over the Punjab countryside.

01From Nanded to Sirhind

Madho Das kept an ashram on the Godavari at Nanded. Guru Gobind Singh came there in 1708, and the bairagi took the Khalsa initiation and the name Banda Singh. The Guru gave him five arrows, a council of five Sikhs and hukamnamas calling the Khalsa of the Punjab to his side. He reached the Punjab in 1709 with a handful of men. Peasants joined him by the thousand. Samana fell in November 1709, then Sadhaura. In May 1710, at Chappar Chiri, his army met Wazir Khan, the faujdar of Sirhind who had walled up the Guru’s two younger sons. Wazir Khan was killed and Sirhind was taken.

02Land to the tiller

He made the hill fort of Mukhlisgarh his seat and renamed it Lohgarh. Coins and a seal were struck in the name of Guru Nanak and Guru Gobind Singh, not in his own. The great zamindari estates were broken up, and the men who ploughed the fields were treated as their owners. For the first time in centuries, the revenue of a large part of the Punjab was gathered by a Khalsa government.

Delhi (Indraprastha)
Place · Indraprastha of the Pandavas; Lal Kot c. 1052 by the Tomara Anangpal; many cities sinceDelhi (Indraprastha)The Pandavas’ Indraprastha stood on the Yamuna where the Purana Qila now stands, and the Tomaras and Chauhans built the first walled Delhi at Mehrauli. Seven or more cities have risen on the same ground since.Read →

03Gurdas Nangal and Delhi

Emperor Farrukhsiyar sent Abdus Samad Khan against him. In 1715 Banda Singh and his men were shut inside a walled compound at Gurdas Nangal near Gurdaspur and starved for months until they could no longer stand. He was taken to Delhi in chains with some 700 followers, paraded through the city and kept in the fort. The Sikhs were beheaded in batches, and none is recorded as taking the offer of life for conversion. In June 1716 Banda Singh was tortured and put to death near the Qutb Minar at Mehrauli, after his small son was killed before his eyes.

Battles

Battle of Samana

Samana was the first Mughal town Banda Singh Bahadur took after Guru Gobind Singh sent him to Punjab. Sikh tradition knew it as the home of the men who had executed Guru Tegh Bahadur and the younger Sahibzade.

November 1709

Battle of Chappar Chiri and the fall of Sirhind

Sent north by Guru Gobind Singh from Nanded, Banda Singh Bahadur gathered the Khalsa of the Punjab and struck at the man who had killed the Guru’s younger sons.

May 1710 CE

Siege of Gurdas Nangal

Banda Singh’s last stand was in a walled compound at Gurdas Nangal, where a Mughal army cut off every grain of food.

1715 CE

Places

Delhi (Indraprastha)Standing
The long resistance: Sindh to Tarain

Delhi (Indraprastha)

The Pandavas’ Indraprastha stood on the Yamuna where the Purana Qila now stands, and the Tomaras and Chauhans built the first walled Delhi at Mehrauli. Seven or more cities have risen on the same ground since.

Lal Kot and Qila Rai Pithora, DelhiRuined
The long resistance: Sindh to Tarain

Lal Kot and Qila Rai Pithora, Delhi

The first walled city of Delhi, built by the Tomaras and enlarged by Prithviraj Chauhan, which fell in 1192. Its temples were pulled down for the Quwwat-ul-Islam mosque, whose own inscription says it was built from 27 temples.

Rajouri (Rajapuri)Standing
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Rajouri (Rajapuri)

Rajapuri of Kalhana’s Rajatarangini, a hill kingdom on the Pir Panjal road into Kashmir, and the birthplace in 1670 of Banda Singh Bahadur. In 1947–48 it was overrun by raiders and retaken by the Indian Army.

Gurdwara Fatehgarh SahibRebuilt
The Mughal era and the resistance

Gurdwara Fatehgarh Sahib

The place outside Sirhind where Guru Gobind Singh’s youngest sons, Zorawar Singh and Fateh Singh, aged about nine and seven, were walled up and put to death in December 1705 on the orders of Wazir Khan, faujdar of Sirhind, for refusing to give up their faith.

Takht Sachkhand Sri Hazur Sahib, NandedRebuilt
The Mughal era and the resistance

Takht Sachkhand Sri Hazur Sahib, Nanded

One of the five takhts of the Sikhs, on the Godavari at Nanded, built over the place where Guru Gobind Singh was cremated in October 1708 after declaring the Guru Granth Sahib his successor. Here too he sent Banda Singh Bahadur north to the Punjab.

Lohgarh, Banda Singh Bahadur’s fortRuined
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Lohgarh, Banda Singh Bahadur’s fort

The hill fort near Sadhaura that Banda Singh Bahadur made the capital of the first Sikh state in 1710, where he struck coins in the names of Guru Nanak and Guru Gobind Singh. Bahadur Shah’s army stormed it in December 1710.

On the timeline

  • 12 May 1710

    Banda Singh Bahadur wins at Chappar ChiriResistance

    Banda Singh Bahadur, sent to Punjab by Guru Gobind Singh, defeats Wazir Khan of Sirhind, the man who had the young Sahibzade killed. Two days later Sirhind falls, and Banda strikes coins in the Gurus’ name at Lohgarh.

  • 9 June 1716

    Banda Singh Bahadur executed at DelhiResistance

    Captured after the siege of Gurdas Nangal, Banda Singh is paraded through Delhi with hundreds of Sikhs, who are beheaded day after day. Refusing to convert, he is tortured to death near the Qutb Minar.