CHANDIGARH:” Never before the Indian history has pure love of death manifested itself so gloriously as in the Sikh history,” said Dr.Noel Q.King, Prof Emeritus University of California, Santa Clara, while delivering a lecture on “Martyrdom in Sikhism” at SGGS College, organized by the Sikh Educational Society here last month.
He said the Sikh Gurus Guru Arjan Dey and GuruTegh Bahadur and their followers made the supreme sacrifice for the sake of the justice and truth. Such sacrifices had aroused much admiration and love by the courage, patriotism and heroic action all over the world that had made Sikhism one of the universal faiths of this earth. Quoting from history, he said the martyrdom was inherent in the Sikh history which guided the coming generation’s olive for a theirs. However, Dr.King did not agree with the idea that whosoever is gunned down by the hostile persons could also be counted in the category of martyrs. He said the persons who could have escaped death while fighting for a good cause but did not do so because he loved his objective more was a real martyr. The Sikh history was full of such martyrs who fought against misrule, injustice and Tyranny from time to time.
Dr Inderjit Singh, Chairman, PSB, in his address highlighted the heroic deeds of Sikh martyrs. He said the Sikhs always fought for the welfare of mankind and faced numerous challenges in the past. Tera Singh Shahi, Principal, SGGS College, said the concept of “Martyrdom is Sikhism” had shown a path of self-sacrifice to, the rest of the world. It was more important to translate the great deeds of our Sikh Gurus into reality.
Dr.Kharak Singh, Secretary, Institute of Sikh Studies, Dr.S.S.Dhanoa, a former TAS officer, Ajit Singh Sirhadi, and Prof Devinder Singh, an eminent scholar of history, also spoke.
Article extracted from this publication >> December 24, 1993
