01November 1675
Kashmiri Pandits, pressed to give up their dharma, had come to Anandpur to ask the ninth Guru for help. Guru Tegh Bahadur told them to say that if he converted, they would too, and he set out for Delhi. He was arrested, held in the kotwali and told to accept Islam or show a miracle. He did neither. Before his eyes Bhai Mati Das was sawn in two, Bhai Dayala boiled in a cauldron and Bhai Sati Das wrapped in cotton and burned. Then, in November 1675, the Guru was beheaded beside the kotwali. Sikh tradition remembers him as Hind di Chadar, the shield of Hindustan.
02The head and the body
In the storm that followed, Bhai Jaita carried the Guru’s head away to Anandpur, where the young Gobind Rai, the future Guru Gobind Singh, received it and cremated it. Lakhi Shah Vanjara hid the body in his cart, took it to his house at Raisina and burned the house to cremate it; Gurdwara Rakab Ganj stands there. In 1783 the Sikh general Baghel Singh, who held Delhi for a time, had shrines built at both places. The present marble gurdwara at Sis Ganj dates from the 20th century; the trunk of the tree under which the Guru was beheaded and the well where he bathed are kept inside.
The life of this place
- November 1675Guru Tegh Bahadur was beheaded here on Aurangzeb’s orders, after his three companions were killed.
- 1783 CEBaghel Singh raised a shrine on the site.
- November 2025The 350th anniversary of the martyrdom was observed.
Open day and night, with langar; it stands in Chandni Chowk, near the Chandni Chowk metro station. Cover your head and leave shoes at the counter.
