MUNSHA SINGH DUKHI (1890-1971), poet and revolutionary, was born the son of Subedar Nihal Singh on 1 July 1890 at Jandiala, in Jalandhar district of the Punjab. He had little formal education, but had acquired a good working knowledge of English, Urdu, Bengali, and Hindi. In 1908, he migrated to the U.S.A. and settled down in San Francisco. While in the States, he became a member of the Ghadr party.
PAHAR SINGH, RAJA (d. 1849), son of Charhat Singh, succeeded his nephew, Atar Singh, in 1827 to the throne of Faridkot. His reign lasting twenty-two years was marked by peace and prosperity. He founded many villages and dug wells and extended cultivation. He helped the British in the first AngloSikh war of 184546, and his timely information to the British commander about the position of the Sikh army in the battle of Pherushahr saved the British army from the disaster that stared it in the face.
RAGHBfR SINGH, RAJA (1834-1887), son of Raja Sarup Singh, ascended the throne of Jind on 31 March 1864 after the death of his father. He was an able and enlightened ruler, indefatigable in his efforts to promote the prosperity of his people. He built the town of Sarigrur on the model of the Rajput city of Jaipur. He helped the British with men and money during the second Afghan war (1878-80) and was rewarded with the title of Rajai Rajgan in perpetuity. Raja Raghbir Singh died in 1887, and was succeeded by his grandson, Ranbir Singh, as his only son, Balbir Singh, had predeceased him.
RIPUDAMAN SINGH, MAHARAJA (1883-1942), ruler of the princely state of Nabha from 1912 to 1923, was born at Nabha on 22 Phagun 1939 Bk/4 March 1883, the only son of Maharaja Hira Singh (1843-1911) and Maharani Jasmer Kaur. His father having resisted British advice to send his heir to one of the newly established Chiefs` Colleges modelled on English public schools, Tikka (heir apparent) Ripudaman Singh was educated by private tutors including Lala Bishan Das and Sardar (Bhai) Kahn Singh, celebrated Sikh scholar and lexicographer.
SARMUKH SINGH (1893-1952), the middle one of the trio of the Jhabal brothers and the first president of the Shiromani Akali Dal, was born in 1893 at Jhabal, in Amritsar district of the Punjab. He received his education at Khalsa College, Amritsar, and started taking interest in social and religious reform while still very young. In 1918, he became a member of the Central Majha Khalsa Diwan. As the Shiromani Akali Dal was formed on 14 December 1920 to be a kind of volunteer corps of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee for the refomation of gurdwara management, he was elected its president.
SHER SINGH, MAHARAJA (1807-1843), Sikh sovereign of the Punjab from January 1841 until his death in September 1843, was the son of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, born on 4 December 1807 to Mahitab Kaur, the Maharaja`s first wife. Sher Singh grew up into a handsome, broad chested young man. His soldierly mien made him popular with the army. He loved hunting and hawking, and devoted attention to cultivating European interests and hobbies in the company of foreigners serving at the Sikh court. In 1820, Maharaja Ranjit Singh conferred upon him civil and military honours and the privilege of sitting on a chair in the Darbar. Sher Singh took part in many of the compaigns undertaken by die Maharaja for the expansion of his kingdom.
TEJA SINGH AKARPURI, JATHEDAR (1892-1975), an active figure in Gurdwara Reform movement, was born at Akarpura, a village 13 km northwest of Batala (31°49`N, 75"12`E), in Gurdaspur district of the Punjab. His father was Pala Singh and mother Partap Kaur. He matriculated from Khalsa Collegiate School, Amritsar, in 1911, and enlisted in the 24th Sikh Battalion of the Indian Army the following year. Leaving the Army, he became a patvanin the revenue department of the Punjab at the end of 1914. He was promoted ziledarm 1918. The Nankana Sahib massacre of February 1921 proved a turning point in the life of Teja Singh.
UJJAL SINGH, SARDAR (1895-1983), parliamentarian, expert in finance and governor, was the younger of the two sons of Sujan Singh and Lakshmi Devi, a family that traced their ancestry back to Bhai Sangat Singh, one of the Chamkaur Sahib martyrs dying with two of Guru Gobind Singh`s elder sons in 1705. A tradesman by profession, Sujan Singh turned to real estate. He came by much prosperity this way. In his till then little known village of Hadali, Ujjal Singh was born on 27 December 1895 in Sindh Sagar Doab of the Punjab (now in Pakistan). His education began in the conventional way.
AJMER SINGH was the name given a seventeenth century Muslim recluse of Chhatteana, a village in present day Faridkot district of the Punjab, as he received the initiatory rites of the Khalsa. His original name was Ibrahim, popularly shortened to Brahmi or Bahmi. According to an old chronicle, Malva Desh Ratan di Sakhi Potbi, Ibrahim had himself dug a grave, duly lined with brick and mortar into which he intended to descend, through a hole he had kept for the purpose, when his time came.
AULUKH, AJMER SINGH Aulukh, Ajmer Singh has published three collections of short plays. Arbad Narbad Dhundakar (Aeons and the Nebula, 1978) includes five such plays. The title is taken from a line of Guru Nanak in the Guru Grantha in which he has given cosmology on the lines of ancient Indian texts. The first, the title play, extends over two acts. Of its five characters, Ranjha and Mirza are heroes of love legends of medieval Punjab, Majnu of medieval Arabia and Farhad of medieval Iran.