Introductory - Global Sikh Studies

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of inspiration, energy and optimism. The greatest causalities the Sikhs
ever suffered were at the hand of Abdali in the battle known as “Wada
Ghallughara” (the great holocaust). When the battle was over, a
Nihang went about saying loudly: ‘The Pure (tat) Khalsa is intact,
only dross has been shed off.’ 15 Forster states that the Sikhs ‘hold a
lamentation for the death of any person criminal’, and ‘make merry on
the demise of any of their brethren’.1 5a
Hari Ram Gupta writes: ‘These Sikhs had to experience very
hard times. Persecuted, exiled, and tracked down like wild beasts,
they kept themselves concealed during the day and came out at night
in search of food. They lived on wild plants, fruit, and flesh. Day by
day their sufferings increased, but they remained firm in their resolution.
During their days of oppression, the Sikhs chose to beguile themselves
in their own simple manner. They coined luxurious names for humble
things of daily use, as also contemptuous expressions for their enemies.’ 16
‘The arrival of one Sikh was announced as the advent of a host
of one lakh and a quarter, five Sikhs declared themselves an army of
five lakhs; death was termed an expedition of the Sikh to the next
world; a blind man was called a wide awake hero; a half-blind man
was addressed as an argues-eyes lion; a deaf man was a person living
in the garret; a hungry man was called mad with prosperity; a stone
morter was named a golden vessel; saag (a cooked preparation of green
leaves) was green pulao; cooked meant was mahaprashad; piluus (the
fruit of a wild tree) were dry grapes, grams were almonds; onions were
silver pieces; to be fined by the Panth for some fault was called getting
one’s salary; to speak was to roar and a damri (a copper coin worth one
quarter of a pice) was called a rupee. On the other hand, a rupee was
nothing but an empty crust.’ 17
‘This is a striking feature of the Sikh life at this time, when they
were suffering from an acute form of persecution. It shows that pain
and suffering had lost all meaning to them, and they could still enjoy
bubbling humour and brightness and vigour of life. Poverty and hardship
served a most useful purpose in uniting them with one another in the
closest ties. All differences which arise between man and man in times
of peace were effaced beneath the terrible levelling of the oppression;