BABAR AKALI MOVEMENT, a radical outgrowth of the Akali movement for the reform of Sikh places of worship during the early 1920\'s. The latter, aiming to have the shrines released from the control of priests who had become lax and effete over the generations, was peaceful in its character

RIYASTI AKALI DAL, representing Sikhs living in the princely states of Patiala, Nabha, Jind, Faridkot and Malerkotla, was set up in 1939 as a political forum parallel to the Riyasti Praja Mandal which had been in existence since 1928 and which had till then represented the people living mainly in

BELA, pronounced bella, means, in Punjabi usage, a jungle of tall grasses, reeds and assorted shrubbery along the banks of rivers and streams. The word also received a different connotation when an Udasi saint and preacher, Banakhandi, established in AD 1818 a preaching centre on an Island in the River

SHIROMANI KHALSA DlWAN, NORTHWEST FRONTIER PROVINCE, a sociopolitical organization of the Sikhs of the frontier province (now in Pakistan), was founded in the 1920`s by Sardar Jagat Singh Narag of Peshawar, a businessman, later a member of the provincial legislative assembly. The Sikh population of the North-West Frontier Province was

BHASAUR SINGH SABHA, or to give its full name Sri Guru Singh Sabha, Bhasaur, was established in 1893 twenty years after the first Singh Sabha came into existence in Amritsar at the village of Bhasaur in the then princely state of Patiala. The Singh Sabha, a powerful

CENTRAL SIKH LEAGUE, political organization of the Sikhs which guided their affairs until the Shiromani Akali Dal emerged as a mass force. The inaugural session of the Central Sikh League was held at Amritsar on 29 December 1919, coinciding with the annual sessions of the Indian National Congress and the

DESH BHAGAT PARIVAR SAHAIK COMMITTEE, originally named Sikh Desh Bhagat Parivar Sahaik Committee, to help the families of patriots, was set up in October 1920 under the chairmanship of Baba Vasakha Singh, a Ghadr revolutionary who had been sentenced to transportation for life, but was released from the Cellular Jail,

GARGAJJ AKALI JATHA (gargajj = rever beratingly thunderous) was the name given a dynamic group (jathd) of Akali reformers, especially active in Majha region of the Punjab. The Jatha came into being on 19 April 1921, splintering from the parent body Central Majha Khalsa Diwan. Teja Singh Bhuchchar, Jathedar

GHADR MOVEMENT. Ghadr, commonly translated as "mutiny," was the name given to the newspaper edited and published for the Hindustani Association of the Pacific Goast which was founded at Portland, United States of America, in 1912. The movement this Association gave rise to for revolutionary activity in India also came

KHALSA CENTRAL COUNCIL, a society formed in Lahore in 1933 to safeguard the interests of the Sikhs, had a very short career. The occasion for the formation of the Council arose when Giani Sher Singh and Master Tara Singh, two prominent Sikh leaders of pre-partition Punjab, openly confronted each other

KHALSA DARBAR, an organization representing different Sikh parties established on 27 September 1932 at Lahore to resist the operation of what had come to be known as the Communal Award announced by the British Government on 16 August 1932. Earlier, anticipating these proposals, an all party Sikh conference convened on