Balwant Singh Rajoana’s mercy petition to be examined on merit: P Chidambaram

Posted on April 1, 2012 by Admin

NEW DELHI: The Home Ministry will examine on merit the mercy petition of Balwant Singh Rajoana, sentenced to death for assassination of former Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh, and it will be submitted to the President for a final decision.

Home Minister P Chidambaram said Rajoana’s mercy petition filed by Shiromani Gurudwara Prabhandhak Committee and the Delhi Sikh Gurudwara Management Committee has come to the Home Ministry two days ago and has been added to the list of mercy petitions of condemned prisoners.

“We will examine it on merit and submit to the President of India,” he said.

Chidambaram said execution of a condemned prisoner has to be stayed once a mercy petition is filed before the President and it should be kept in abeyance till a decision is taken on the prayer.

He said guidelines in this regard were very clear. Once a mercy petition is filed on behalf of a sentenced prisoner, the sentence cannot be executed unless there is a decision on the mercy petition.

“So, when we got the copy of the mercy petition (of Rajoana) from the President’s Secretariat, we immediately drew the attention of the government of Punjab to the standing guidelines and the instructions.

“By drawing the attention of government of Punjab to the standing guidelines and instructions, does not mean the Home Ministry is expressing any opinion on the merits of the mercy petition,” he said.

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Manmohan Singh – First Sikh Prime Minister of India

Posted on March 30, 2012 by Admin

The first Sikh Indian prime minister, Singh was sworn in on May 22, 2004. He is a native Punjabi speaker. Manmohan Singh is the 14th and current Prime Minister of India, considered to be the “architect of modern India.”[1] He was born on 26 September 1932, in Gah, West Punjab (now in Pakistan) and is a member of the Indian National Congress party.

Singh is an economist by trade, and has formerly served in the International Monetary Fund. His economics education included an undergraduate (1952) and a master’s degree (1954) from Punjab University; an undergraduate degree (1957) from Cambridge University (St. John’s College); and a doctorate (1962) from Oxford University (Nuffield College). Continue reading →

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Banda Bahadur-First Sikh King

Posted on March 30, 2012 by Admin

Baba Banda Singh Bahadur is revered as one of Sikhism’s greatest warriors as well as one of its most hallowed martyrs and was the first sikh king. His confronation with the Mughal administration in Northern India, though brief, was strong enough to shake its foundations.

Early life
Banda was born on October 16, 1670 at Rajouri in the Jammu region of Jammu and Kashmir, into a family of Minhas Rajputs. He was named Lachman Dev. Wrestling, horseback riding, and hunting were his major hobbies. As a young man, he shot a doe and was shocked to watch the mother and her aborted fawn writhing in pain and dying. After this gloomy scene, he had a change of heart. He left his home and became a disciple of a Bairagi Sadhu, Janaki Das, who gave him the name, Madho Das. In the company of the Sadhus he traveled through Northern India and finally arrived at Nanded (in present-day Maharashtra), situated on the bank of the river Godavari, where he built a hut to meditate upon God.

Madho Das meets Guru Gobind Singh
In the September of 1708, Guru Gobind Singh, who had come to the Deccan along with the Mughal Emperor, Bahadur Shah, happened to go to Madho Das’ hut while hunting. Madho Das was away. The Guru ordered his disciples to cook food there and then. The matter was reported to Madho Das, who was enraged. He had learnt Tantra and tried some tricks to humiliate the Guru. But none had any effect on Guru Gobind. The Guru then asked him, “Who are you?” Madho Das, who had accepted defeat, said with great humility, “I am your banda (slave).” The Guru inquired, if he knew who he was talking to. Banda said he was none other than Guru Gobind Singh. The Guru encouraged him to give up his present way of living and resume the duties of a true warrior.

Banda’s mission
Guru Gobind Singh hoped that Emperor Bahadur Shah would fulfill his promise and do justice in the Punjab by punishing the Governor of Sirhind, Nawab Wazir Khan and his accomplices for their crimes against the people including the deaths of the Guru’s mother, Mata Gujri and his two younger sons, Sahibzada Zorawar Singh and Sahibzada Fateh Singh. Finding him reluctant, the Guru deputed Madho Das Bairagi, under the leadership of five Sikhs, to end Mughal persecution of non-Muslims in the Punjab.

In a few days, the Guru held a durbar, baptised Madho Das and conferred the title of Banda Bahadur on him. He appointed him as his military lieutenant and invested him with full political and military authority as his deputy to lead the campaign in the Punjab against the Mughal administration.

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Milkha Singh – The Flying Sikh

Posted on March 30, 2012 by Admin

Dubbed the “Flying Sikh”, Milkha Singh is the First Sikh and the only Indian to have broken an Olympic track record. He was also the first Indian to reach Olympic Finals

Milkha Singh can be described as one of the most extraordinary athletes of our times. Milkha Singh was a genius and a genius is never trained. Without any formal training, without any financial reward and without any emotional support (he lost his parents during Partition and he had only an elder brother and a sister to look for help) Milkha Singh took on the greatest athletes of his time and proved himself as good if not better. The burst of speed with which he broke the previous Olympic Games record of 5.9 seconds in 400 meters is now a part of folk lore in Punjab. The fairy tale is repeated as part of Punjab’s rich heritage. Milkha is no less popular than Pele in Brazil and Maradona in Argentina. Generation after generation in India will remember fondly his exploits with which he set the tracks ablaze whenever and wherever he ran. Rarely has it happened in the Olympic history when so many athletes went on to break the greatest race of his time, this he had to, since he had to, since he had on blocks with him world’s greatest athletes of his time. Who would have dared to challenge their might, expect Milkha, who though respected them yet never feared them. He simply ran-SUPERB.

“The mistake that I committed would rankle in my heart till the end of my days. I could not wipe out the defi cit of those six or seven yards on the last 100 metres, even though I gathered superhuman speed,” he wrote in an Indian newspaper. “The gold medal on which I had staked my life eluded me . . . Two sorrowful events will always remain with me: one is Partition, in which my parents were butchered, and the other is the race in Rome, where through my own fault I missed winning the gold for my country.” Singh’s resume is nonetheless superb, boasting 77 wins from 80 races including gold in the 400 at the 1958 Commonwealth Games, and he remains India’s greatest track athlete.

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The First Case Won by Satguru Ram Das in Mughal Court in Early 1581

Posted on March 30, 2012 by Admin

The opponents of Gurmat made a complaint at the court of Akbar in 1579, that much is written against Islam by Sikh Satgurus. Accordingly, a message was sent to the Court of Satguru Ram Das. Akbar has already granted many bighas of land to Bibi Bhani Ji in 1577( Ref. Amritsar District Gazette,1883).

The opponents of Gurmat can not bear this grant.Hence, they lodged a forged complaint at the royal court of Akbar. Bhai Gurdas Ji was deputed for this case.Bhai Gurdas Ji also gave a Manuscript of Japuji Sahib to Akbar.When Akbar got it read by other, he concluded that ” this is a book of Allah(God)”, and dismissed the case against” Nanuk- Panthis”. Rather he( Akbar) included Ek- Onkar, in the first Islamic coin of Din-I-Ilahi issued in 1581.This was the first official defeat of opponents.

The Sikh History has been changed from the times of Jahangir onward, particularly. from 1628, when the manuscript of Tuzuk-I-Jahangir came into being. The issue of the first coin in the name of Satguru Nanak Sahib in 1616 by East Indianan Company.For your kind information, the first lie of Jahangir was reported from Lahore in a letter of a Christian Pries from Lahore, regarding the martyrdom of Satguru Arjan Sahib9 letter Dated September 29, 1606).

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Center govt stays hanging of Balwant Singh Rajoana, Badals meet President of India

Posted on March 28, 2012 by Admin

CHANDIGARH: The President of India has forwarded the appeal made by SGPC for clemency to Balwant Singh Rajoana against whom a Chandigarh court has issued eath warrants. The Union home ministry has subsequnetly stayed the operation of death warrants till the matter is decided by the Supreme Court of India and The President of India.

Punjab Chief Minister PARKASH sINGH Badal and Deputy CM and SAD President Sukhbir Singh Badal met the President of India Mrs. Pratibha Patil at 6.45 PM at Rashtarpati Bhawan and briefed about the facts of the case and requested her to consider the clemency petition filed by SGPC. President of India referred the mater to Union Home Ministry which stayed the hanging till matter is sattled legally.

Meanwhile, Sukhbir Singh Badal has made an appeal to people of Punjab to stop protest marches since hanging of Rajoana has been stayed. He also appealed to maintain peace and harmony.

Akal Takht Jathedar Giani Gurbachan Singh has also thanked the CM and Deputy CM for making earnest efforts to save the life of Bhai Rajoana.

A complete bandh was observed today in Punjab to express solidarity with Rajoana who is lodged in Patiala central jail. Earlier the Superintendent of Jail Lakhwinder Singh Jakhar had refused to accept the death warrants issued by Chandigarh court on the ground that an appeal for review of death sentence by co-accused Lakhwinder Singh Lakha is still pending in the Supreme Court of India.

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