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ANANDPUR

ANANDPUR (31° 13\'N, 76° 32\'E). lit. City of Bliss, is situated on one of the lower spurs of the Shivalik range in Ropar district of the Punjab. Connected to the rest of the country by rail and road, it lies 31 km north of Ropar (Rup Nagar) and 29 km south of Nangal Township. Being one of the supremely important pilgrimage centres of the Sikhs, it is reverently called Anandpur Sahib. Takht Sri Kesgarh Sahib, one of the five takhts (lit. thrones) or seats of highest religious authority for Sikhs, and several other holy shrines are located here. Having been the abode of the last two Gurus of the Sikhs for two score years, the town was witness to many a momentous event of Sikh history. The foundation of Anandpur was laid by Guru Tegh Bahadur (162175), Nanak IX, on 19 June 1665, on a piece of land, covering the ruined mound of an older village, Makhoval, which the Guru had earlier purchased for this purpose from the Rajput hill state of Kahlur (Bilaspur). He named the new habitation Chakk Nanaki after his mother, and shifted here with his family from Kiratpur, 8 km south of it. But soon after, he set out on his extensive travels across the eastern parts. The development of Chakk Nanaki was thus interrupted till after his return in 1672. The small habitation then grew into a flourishing town frequented by devotees from the Punjab and elsewhere. In May 1675, a group of Brahmans from Kashmir came to the Guru with their tale of woe. The burden of their submission was the religious persecution and forcible conversion which were the order of the day in Kashmir under its Mughal governor. Guru Tegh Bahadur resolved to go to Delhi, the Imperial capital, to have their grievance remedied, or to lay down his life in the cause of religious freedom. Naming his young son, Gobind Das (Later, Singh), hardly nine years of age, his spiritual successor, he set out on the journey, preaching the holy word in towns and villages he passed through. In Delhi, he was taken into custody, tortured and executed publicly under the orders of Emperor Aurangzeb in the Chandni Chowk on 11 November 1675. Back at Chakk Nanaki, the young successor, Guru Gobind Singh (16661708), received and cremated with exemplary courage and composure the severed head of his father, brought at great personal risk by a daring Sikh, Bhai Jaita. As he grew up, Guru Gobind Singh assumed a soldierly style which aroused the envy of the local ruler, Raja Bhim Chand of Kahlur. To avoid an early conflict, Guru Gobind Singh, accepting an invitation from the chief of another hill state, Sirmur, to visit him, left Chakk Nanaki in 1685 to stay at Ponta on the bank of the Yamuna. After the battle of Bhangani (18 September 1688) fought against the combined force of Rajput hill monarchs, he returned to Chakk Nanaki, which he now renamed Anandpur after one of a ring efforts (Anandgarh) which he, apprehending further trouble from the hill rajas, now undertook to raise. The forts were Kesgarh, in the centre and Anandgarh, Lohgarh, Holgarh, Fatehgarh and Taragarh around it. Bhim Chand and his son, Ajmer Chand of Kahlur, had not shed their chagrin over the defeat they had suffered at Bhangani at the hands of the Guru, although the latter had helped them in the battle of Nadaun (1691) against a Mughal general sent against them by the governor of Jammu. They made an alliance with the Katoch ruler of Kangra and several other chiefs, attacking Anandpur more than once, but each time Guru Gobind Singh repulsed their onslaught. On Baisakhi day, 30 March 1699, Guru Gobind Singh carried out the supreme task of his career converting the sangat into Khalsa. Instructions had been sent out during the previous year to sangats, or Sikh communities, in various parts not to recognize any longer the masands as the Guru\'s representatives and to come to Anandpur for the following Baisakhi festival in large numbers. They had also been asked to come, where practicable, mounted. On the appointed day a massive assembly took place in the Fort of Kesgarh at Anandpur. As all sat rapt in the morning service, Guru Gobind Singh, according to one of the earlier sources, Kuir Singh, Gurbilas Patshahi 10, made a dramatic appearance, a naked sword in his hand, and asked if any one of the assembly would be willing to offer his head to him. The audience were benumbed to hear this strange demand. Guru Gobind Singh repeated his call twice. At the third call, one Daya Ram, a Khatri from Lahore, offered himself. The Guru took him into an adjoining enclosure. After a while he returned, his sword dripping blood, and asked for another head. This time, Dharam Das, a Jat from Hastinapur, came forward and was led to the enclosure as had been his predecessor. Likewise, three other disciples, Mohkam Chand, a washerman from Dvarka, Himmat, a water carrier from Jagannath, and Sahib Chand, a barber from Bidar, in the South, offered themselves. The fear of the sangat turned to amazement and wonder when, soon after, the Guru led the five back, all dressed alike in saffron coloured gowns with neatly tied turbans on their heads and swords dangling by their sides. Guru Gobind Singh administered to the Five vows of baptism, giving them five palmsful of amrit or sweetened elixir sanctified by recitation over it of holy hymns and stirred with a steel khanda, double edged sword, and introduced them to the sangat as his panj piare, Five Beloved. He announced that with the baptism of the Panj Piare he had inaugurated the Khalsa, a brotherhood of holy soldiers who would be distinguished by five symbols all beginning with the letter \'k\', viz. kes (uncut hair), kangha (comb), kachchha (pair of shorts), kara (steel bracelet) and kirpan (sword). The Khalsa were vowed to live up to the highest moral and ethical standards and to be ever ready to fight tyranny and injustice. They were to recognize no distinctions of caste, creed or status. The Guru himself stood up before the Panj Piare and begged with folded hands to be admitted to their ranks. Several thousands followed on that and on subsequent days to receive the rites of initiation by the double edged sword. Anandpur thus became the birthplace of the Khalsa. It is known commonly as Khalse di vasi (Home of the Khalsa). The emergence of the Khalsa caused panic among the chiefs of the surrounding hill principalities and they planned together strategy to dislodge the Guru from Anandpur. They sent to him emissaries who assured him on oath that they would forever cease troubling him and his Sikhs if only he would temporarily leave his citadel and move out of the town. At the same time, they secretly sought armed assistance from the Mughal faujdar of Sirhind in order to encircle Anandpur and force the Guru out of the town. Guru Gobind Singh left Anandpur but, still suspicious of the rajas intentions, encamped at the village of Hardo Namoh, 4 km south of Kiratpur, taking up a tactically viable defensive position. He was attacked by the hill chiefs from the north and by the Mughal contingents equipped with cannon from the south. These attacks, which according to BhattVahis took place on 7,12 and 13 October 1700, were repulsed and on 14 October, Guru Gobind Singh and his Sikhs broke the cordon and crossed the River Sutlej into Basohli, a small chiefship friendly with the Guru. This action is known as the battle of Nirmohgarh. As soon as the imperial troops withdrew, the Guru reoccupied Anandpur. The hill chiefs then waited upon Emperor Aurangzib and warning him of the new danger that the rise of the Khalsa spelt for his kingdom, entreated him to take some severe measures. Himself critically engaged in dealing with the Maratha insurrection in the South, the emperor ordered the governor of Lahore and the faujdar of Sirhind to act in this behalf in concert with the hill chiefs. A combined force marched upon Anandpur and laid siege to the town in May 1705. The Guru and his Sikhs withstood their repeated assaults for several months despite scarcity of provisions resulting from the prolonged blockade. The besiegers were eventually tired out and offered on solemn oath safe exit to the Guru and the Sikhs if
they evacuated Anandpur. Guru Gobind Singh along with his family and men left the town during the night of 56 December 1705. Before departing, the Guru directed one of his Sikhs, Gurbakhsh, an Udasi by faith, to stay behind to look after the local sangat and the shrines, especially the one commemorating the site where Guru Tegh Bahadur\'s head had been cremated. Years later, as the situation permitted, Gulab Rai and Shyam Singh, sons of Guru Gobind Singh\'s first cousin, Dip Chand, who had since the evacuation of Anandpur taken refuge with the friendly Raja of Nahan, came back. Gulab Rai purchased the town of Anandpur from the Raja of Bilaspur and pretending to be a successor to Guru Gobind Singh established his own religious seat, remonstrances from Gurbakhsh Udasi notwithstanding. All the four sons of Gulab Rai had predeceased him. His widow managed the affairs for some time, but soon died having bequeathed the gaddito Sodhi Surjan Singh, a grandson of Shyam Singh. After the conquest of the Punjab by the Sikhs, several rulers and chiefs made rich endowments to the shrines which continued to be managed by the local Sodhi family until the rise of the Gurdwara reform or the Akali movement in the early 1920\'s. The shrines at Anandpur were occupied by the Akalis on 12 January 1923; they were formally handed over to the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee by the local Sodhis on 15 March 1923. The historic shrines are now managed by the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, Amritsar, through a manager appointed by it. The Jathedar of Takht Sri Kesgarh Sahib is an exofficial member of the Shiromani Committee. The shrines: TAKHT SRI KESGARH SAHIB is the principal shrine at Anandpur. Resplendent in its white marble glory, the shrine stands on a hillock and marks the site of the Kesgarh Fort where the historic Baisakhi congregation of 1699 had taken place. The present complex was constructed during 193644 under the supervision of Sant Hari Singh Kaharpuri. Being on a slope, the complex has two levels protected by retaining walls on the sides. On the lower level, approached by a flight of steps is the imposing two storeyed gateway, offices, and a 30 metre square courtyard. The level on which stands the main building is 2.5 metres higher than the courtyard. The 16 metre square hall with a balcony in front contains within it the sanctum, a 5.5 metre square room in which some old weapons preserved as sacred relics from the time of Guru Gobind Singh are displayed on a low platform. The Guru Granth Sahib is seated under a canopy outside the sanctum, above which rises a fluted lotus dome topped by a tall ornamental pinnacle of gilded metal, and a gilded khanda as a fmial. On the roof, corners of the hall and the balcony are adorned with domed kiosks. Guru ka Langar is on the lower level behind the central building. The lower slopes of the Kesgarh hill are covered with rows of residential rooms for staff and pilgrims. This complex is collectively known as Dashmesh Nivas. A 55 metre square divan hall, about 150 metres east of the central building, was added during the 1980\'s to cater for large congregations on festival occasions. A sarovar or bathing tank, 80 metre square, in a walled compound is situated at ground level to the west of the Takht Sahib and close to the Ropar Nangal road. The relics placed in the inner sanctum of Takht Sri Kesgarh Sahib include a khanda, a katar (dagger), a saif (double edged straight tapering sword), a muzzle loading musket, a spear known as karpa barchha, and a nagani (a kind of spear with a twisted and pointed blade). Another set of weapons also believed to have once belonged to Guru Gobind Singh, which had been taken away by the British to England after the occupation of the Punjab in 1849 and which had been brought back from there at the time of the celebration of the 300th birth anniversary of Guru Gobind Singh in 196667 are now on display here. GURDWARA QILA ANANDGARH SAHIB is situated on another spur, about 800 metres southeast of Takht Sri Kesgarh Sahib. It is a newly constructed building though marks of the old, original structure are also still traceable. The present building complex was raised during the 1970\'s by Sant Seva Singh (d. 1982) whose successors are now managing and further developing it. Earlier, during the 1930\'s, Kartar Singh Kalasvalia had got a fort like building constructed which is still intact on top of the hillock. The present Gurdwara, separated from this building by a spacious terrace paved with slabs of streaked marble, is a 15 metre square hall with an 8x3 metre porch in front. The 6 metre square sanctum within the hall has above it a lotus dome topped with a gilded pinnacle and khanda as a finial. The entire wall surface has a facing of streaked marble. This building was completed in 1970. The water level of an old baoli, a stepped well 4 metre in diametre, is approached through a covered passage. The baoh has 135 marbled steps. At the lower levels on the eastern flank of the main building are a spacious hall for Guru ka Langar constructed in 1972, and 300 rooms for pilgrims and administrators. GURDWARA QILA FATEHGARH SAHIB, situated on the northern outskirts of the town of Anandpur, marks the site of another fortress bearing this name. The present building was constructed during the late 1980\'s under the supervision of the successors of Sant Seva Singh of Qila Anandpur. The Gurdwara is a two storeyed domed building. In front of it is an old well which once served the needs of Fatehgarh Fort. GURDWARA QILA LOHGARH SAHIB, one and a half kilometre southwest of Takht Sri Kesgarh Sahib, marks the site of the fort of that name constructed by Guru Gobind Singh to protect the riverside flank. It was here that Bhai Bachittar Singh faced and turned back a drunken elephant which the hill chiefs, during their siege of Anandpur in 1700, had sent to batter down the gate of this fort. The present building, octagonal in shape and three storeyed high with a dome on top, was constructed during the late 1980\'s. GURDWARA HOLGARH SAHIB stands on the site of Holgarh Fort, one and a half km northwest of the town across the Charan Gariga rivulet. It was here that Guru Gobind Singh introduced in the spring of 1701, the celebration of hola on the day following the Hindu festival of colour throwing, holi. Unlike the playful sprinkling of colours as is done during holi, the Guru made hola an occasion for Sikhs to demonstrate skills alarms in simulated battle. Hola or Hola Mahalla, became thereafter an annual tourney of warlike sports in Anandpur as long as the Guru stayed there. The observance of Hola Mahalla was revived after the Sikhs had established their rule in Punjab. It is now the biggest festival of Anandpur. The mahalla or the march on this occasion starting from the Takht Sahib on the concluding day of the week long festival ends at Holgarh, where sports like fencing, coil throwing and tent pegging are held. The present building, a three storeyed octagonal, domed edifice, was constructed under the supervision of Sant Seva Singh and was completed in 1970. The sanctum is in the middle of the marbled ground floor. GURDWARA MATA JITO JI, built within a half acre enclosure just outside Agampura village, about 2 km northwest of Anandpur marks the site where the body of Mata Jito Ji, wife of Guru Gobind Singh, was cremated in December 1700. The present three storeyed domed building was completed in 1972. The 4 metre square sanctum marked off by four pillars is in the middle of the square hall on the ground floor. The fluted lotus dome on top of the building has a gold plated pinnacle and a gilded khan da as finial. GURDWARA MANJI SAHIB also called Damalgarh located close to the precincts of Takht Sri Kesgarh Sahib is dedicated to Guru Gobind Singh\'s sons who used this place for learning and practising martial skills. The double storey domed building of the shrine stands in the middle of a 20 metre square marble paved compound. Its 3 metre square sanctum is in the middle of a 15 metre square hall on the ground floor. GURDWARA SIS GANJ SAHIB within the town is sacred to Guru Tegh Bahadur whose he
ad was cremated here in November 1675. A memorial shrine in the form of a platform whithin a small room was got constructed over the ashes by Guru Gobind Singh himself. At the time of the evacuation of Anandpur in December 1705, Guru Gobind Singh especially entrusted it to the care of Gurbakhsh Udasi. The renovation and enlargement of the monument were carried out under the supervision of Baba Seva Singh of Anandgarh during the early 1970\'s. The original pavement in the front compound with old Nanakshahi bricks arranged in geometrical patterns is still intact. The two storey building with a pinnacled dome provides a 4.5 metre wide covered circumambulatory passage supported on exquisitively designed marble columns around the inner sanctum where the Guru Granth Sahib is seated. ARAL BUNGA opposite Gurdwara Sis Ganj within the same compound is a small shrine housed in an old building said to have been built by a pujari, priest, Man Singh in 1889. It comprises a pentagonal room on either side of a masonry pedestal on which the Guru Granth Sahib is seated behind glass panels. The pedestal marks the spot sitting where during the obsequies of his father, Guru Gobind Singh delivered a sermon to his followers. GURDWARA DAMDAMA SAHIB stands, along with Thara Sahib and Bhora Sahib in the same compound, close to Sis Ganj, formerly called Guru ke Mahal, i.e. residential quarters of Guru Tegh Bahadur. Damdama Sahib marks the site where the Guru used to sit while receiving and addressing visiting sangats. The ceremony of installing Guru Gobind Singh as Guru was performed here. The present domed octagonal building was constructed during the early decades of the 20th century. THARA SAHIB, an half a metre high and 5 metre square marble paved platform stands in the open space in front of Damdama Sahib. It was here that Guru Tegh Bahadur received the group of Kashmiri Pandits who called on him in 1675. GURDWARA BHORA SAHIB, a three storeyed domed building close to Damdama Sahib, was a part of Guru ke Mahal. Here in a bhora (basement) Guru Tegh Bahadur used to retire for solitary meditation. A 1.5 metre square and half a metre high platform in the middle of the present basement marks the site of the original bhora. The Holy Book is now seated on a platform on the ground floor. Extension of this Gurdwara involving blocks for Guru ka Langar and residential accommodation is in progress.

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PUNJABI is the language of the Punjab. Spoken slightly differently in two parts of the Punjab after the State was politically split into two, East Punjab and West Punjab (or Pakistan Punjab), on 15 August 1947. But the Punjabispeaking population is not confined to the political boundaries of the two Punjabs. In India Punjabi is also spoken in vast areas of Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and the Ganganagar district of Rajasthan. In Pakistan too there are Punjabispeaking areas beyond the West ern Punjab; they are in North Western Frontier Province, Sindh and some territories of Jammu and Poonch under Pakistan`s occupation at present. Dr George A. Grierson, author of the monumental. Linguistic Survey of India, accepts Western Punjabi the language of Western Punjab as an independent language; but all speakers of Eastern and Western Punjabi have always treated Western Punjabi as a dialect of Punjabi. Even on the basis of linguistic analysis it cannot be established that it is a language different from Punjabi. The label Lahnda, given it by Grierson, is also incorrect; it is Lahndi, or more properly, Laihndi. Punjabi has three dialects with a number of subdialects in each of these. Eastern Punjabi, the language of Indian Punjab, has four subdialects, viz. Majhi, Malvai, Doabi and Puadhi. Western Punjabi or Lahndi contains Multani, ShahpuriJhangi, Pothohari and Hindko as subdialects. The third dialect, Pahari or Dogri, also has four subdialects Kangri, Bhattiali, Jammuali (the language of Jammu region) an Poonchi. The Dogrispeaking people are striving to get government recognition claiming that their language is different from Punjabi. But each region is claiming a separate entity of its own language: language of Jammu with the label Dogri, and that of Himachal Pradesh, naming it Himachali, PahariMajhi. The language ofMajha region, consisting ofAmritsar and Gurdaspur districts of the Indian Punjab, and the Lahore district of the Pakistani Punjab, is accepted to be the standard form of Punjabi both in India and Pakistan. Punjabi is one of the New IndoAryan languages. IndoAryan is a branch of IndoEuropean family. It has passed through several phases of development, which, for the sake of convenience, are divided into three main stages: old IndoAryan (OIA), Middle IndoAryan (MIA) and New IndoAryan (NIA). The period of OIA is accepted to be from 1500 BC to 500 BC. The earliest form of OIA is called `Vedic`, that is, the language in which the Vedas were composed. Its next phase is Sanskrit, which ceased to be the spoken language of the masses by the sixth century BC, but extensive literature was produced in Sanskrit up to eleventh and twelfth centuries. The MIA has three phases of development. Pali is the representative of the first phase. It is believed that it was the spoken language in the northwestern parts of India from about 500 BC to the beginning of the Christian era. The various languages which were current in the second phase of the MIA are given a common label Prakrit; their period extends from the beginning of the Christian era to around AD 500. In the third phase again all languages have a common label Apabhransha. It is from these Apabhrarishas that Punjabi and New IndoAryan languages developed around the eleventh century AD. Before analysing the linguistic characteristics of Punjabi it would be desirable to discuss the process of development through which Punjabi has attained its present form. The earliest form of the IndoAryan language, the OIA, was structurally much different from NIA or Punjabi. Vedic had 52 phonemes,13 vowels and 39 consonants. In Sanskrit some of these phonemes disappeared and some others were articulated in a changed form. On grammatical side OIA was a highly synthetic language. It employed suffixes and prefixes to perform the function for which independent words are used in NIA. Suffixes, called vibhaktis, were employed where Punjabi, Hindi, etc., are using postpositions. Again, the verbal forms of the OIA were also of synthetic nature. The auxiliary verb did not exist, its function was performed by affixes. There were three gendersmasculine, feminine and neuter; three numbers singular, dual and plural; and eight cases. The nouns and adjectives in OIA changed their form according to number, gender and case, and as such the grammatical forms of a noun or adjective could run into hundreds. In addition to these devices, OIA made extensive use of sandht and samds (compounding). The result of all these processes was that morphological forms were much complicated, but syntactic structure was simpler than it is in the NIA. Since the grammatical status of a noun (whether it was subject, object, etc.) was determined from its form; its position in a sentence did not have much significance. Pali is considerably different from OIA on phonological level. Against 52 phonemes ofVedic, Pali had only 4610 vowels and 36 consonants. Out of the 13 vowels ofVedic 4 were diphthongs in Pali. All vowels are simple, none has a diphthongal character. Of the three fricatives /S/, /S/ and /S/ of OIA, Pali retains only /S/. The grammatical structure of Pali is not much different from OIA. The language is still synthetic. Three genders are present, there are only two numbersthe dual number has disappeared. There are only six vibhaktts (caseendings) in place of eight that existed in OIA. Next, in the sequence of development, come the Prakrits. Scholars have varied opinions about the number of Prakrits. The specimens available to the modern scholars prove that there were at least four major Prakrits Shaurseni, Maharashtri, Maghdhi and Ardhamaghdhi. Paishachi is sometimes counted as a Fifth Prakrit. On the phonological side, Prakrits are not much different from Pali. The fricatives /S/ and /S/ do not exist in Prakrits. The semivowel /y/ has changed to /j/ in some Prakrits, particuarly in Shaurseni, which was spoken in the northwestern India, and is, like Pali, the ancestor of Punjabi. Consonant clusters, which abound in OIA, go on progressively decreasing in MIA. Prakrits are less synthetic than Vedic, Sanskrit and even Pali. Words, which have functions akin to those of postpositions, are used in certain constructions. Now there are only four caseendings mostly in use. Most of the nouns and adjectives, in masculine, singlular form, end ino, and therefore Prakrits are called `oending languages`. The number of Apabhranshas remains undecided. Different sources count from three to about thirty Apabhranshas. There is no clue available to ascertain as to which of the Apabhranshas is the source of Punjabi. None of the Apabhranshas which have extant specimens, can be associated with Punjabi. The Apabhranshas are more analytical than even the Prakrits. Some postpositions are in use now. The auxiliary verb has also appeared in a few verbal forms. Only three caseendings are in common use. The compounded form of verbs is quite common. Still the language is much more synthetic than the NIA. In Apabhranshas most nouns end inu, in masculine, singular form; on the basis of this characteristic the Apabhranshas are sometimes called `uending languages.` There are some variations in phonological pattern as well. The phoneme /n/ has a very high frequency. The number of voiced, aspirated consonants has considerably increased and aspirated forms of /n, n, m, 1, r/ are found in most Apabhranshas. This is the brief survey of the history of the development of IndoAryan languages from its earlist form to the New IndoAryan. Punjabi is one of the NIA languages, the others being Sindhi, Western Hindi, Eastern Hindi, Rajasthani, Gujarati, Marathi, Oriya, Bihari, Bengali, Assamese and Pahari. Punjabi, along with other NIA languages, is believed to have originated in the eleventh century. It is not logically or linguistically correct to accept that all NIA languages originated at the same time, or they developed at the same pace. Languages do not change their form in a few years, or in a few decades; it takes centuries for a language to adopt a recognizably different structure. When we say that Punjabi originated in the eleventh cen
tury, it simply means that by this time the language had acquired most characteristics of modern Punjabi but it certainly was not exactly akin to the presentday language. Punjabi has passed through different stages or phases of development during these nine centuries. For the sake of convenience we can divide the course of development into the following four phases: First phase up to AD 1400 Second phase 1400 to 1700 Third phase 1700 to 1850 Fourth phase 1850 onwards The only specimens of the first phase that have reached our hands are in the form of the poetic compositions of Sufi saint Shaikh Farid (11751265), which are preserved in Sikh Scripture, the Guru Granth Sahib. The linguistic structure of the verses of Shaikh Farid is not different from the language of Guru Nanak and his successors contained in the same holy book. The language of Farid linguistically belongs to the second phase, and true specimens of the first phase are not available. The poetry of Guru Nanak (14691539), Guru Arigad (15041552), Guru Amar Das (14791574), Guru Ram Das (15341581), Guru Arjan (15631606), and some other saint poets found in the Guru Granth Sahib belongs to the second phase. The poetry of Sikh scholar and poet Bhai Gurdas, Sufi saint Shah Husain and Damodarwho versified the love story ofHir and Ranjha, also belongs to the same period. Some prose was also written in this period. But these compositions have not reached us in true, original form. Therefore, we shall consider the Punjabi poetry of the first five Sikh Gurus only for the purpose of a linguistic analysis of this phase. This period is rightly called `Guruperiod`. Punjabi of this period is much more analytical as compared to Sanskrit, Pali, etc. Still it retains some synthetic features. Some of the caseendings are quite common, particularly the suffixes of instrumental, locative and ablative cases. The auxiliary verb is almost nonexistent, and the verbal forms are of synthetic nature. All the postpositions of modern Punjabi, with the lone exception of ne, are in use, though some of these are slightly different from their modern form. Thus synthetic and analytic devices (suffixes and postpositions) are used side by side. On the phonological level too the Punjabi of this period has some variation from the modern Punjabi. Fricatives /s/ (/sh/) and / z/ do not exist in the Punjabi of this period. Vowel (/au/) has a very low frequency; on the contrary (/ai/) has much higher frequency. Again, nasalization was not so frequent as it is today. The plural forms of masculine and feminine nouns end in nasalized vowels in modern Punjabi, most of these have only oral vowel at the end in the language of the Guruperiod. Most masculine nouns have the ending`a` in singular form, and most feminine, singular nouns end in `I`. But the Apabhrarisha uending nouns are also very common. All masculine nouns which end in a consonant in singular form in modern Punjabi retained the Apabhransha `u` at the end in old Punjabi of first and second phases. Short vowels do not occur in wordfinal position now, but in the Punjabi of Guruperiod final short vowel was a common feature. The Punjabi of the third phase is almost as analytical as the modern language. Some^ of the case`suffixes do exist, as they exist today, but in most cases the postposition of modern Punjabi, including nai (modern ne) is in use. The forms of nouns, pronouns and adjectives are almost the same as they are today. Short vowels in wordfinal position are disappearing. Nasalization is increasing and plural form of the nouns and adjectives ends in a nasalized vowel in most cases, /s/ (/sh/) and /z/ are still nonexistent. The frequency of vowel /au/ has considerably increased. The most significant aspect of the Punjabi of this period is the emergence of tone which has vastly changed the phonological structure of the language. The period of emergence of tone cannot be ascertained with any reasonable precision. Certain orthographic symbols in the Guru Granth suggest that some form of tone did exist in the Guruperiod. At the same time it seems certain that the tone had not the same frequency and the same characteristics as in modern Punjabi, otherwise the orthographic pattern of the Gurmukhi script would have been quite different. Like the two earlier phases this was also primarily a period of poetry. Very few prose works were produced. The poetic language of this phase lacks the sophistication and dignity of the language of Gurbani (poetry of the Gurus). Prose writings are wanting in controlled expression and literary discipline. However the language of prose is simple and has a poetic flow. The fourth phase, which continues till today, is different from the earlier stages in many ways. It begins with the establishment of British sovereignty in Punjab. A large number of schools were started, which enabled common people to get education. The advent of the printing press and the start of newspapers and journals made a drastic change in the language awareness of the Punjabis. As the number of readers increased, more and more books were written and printed. The teaching of English was responsible for initiating a new era of linguistic innovation. A large number of vocables of PerseArabic origin were borrowed by Punjabi during the period of Muslim domination, but phonological and grammatical structure of Punjabi remained unaffected by these borrowings. Loan words were assimilated by Punjabi, but foreign sounds were not accepted. Punjabi retained its original character in spite of heavy borrowings. During British rule, however, foreign sounds were also accepted at least by the educated people. Many words were borrowed from English. Written Punjabi underwent a complete change. The punctuation marks were introduced for the First time; the full stop was the only punctuation mark used in earlier writings. Another significant innovation was writing of separate wordunits, instead of the lineunit which was the common mode of writing in earlier works. Paragraph forming was yet another device which Punjabi acquired from English. Punjabi writers copied the English style of framing lengthy complex sentences. In addition to borrowing of vocables from other languages, new words were coined and new shades of meanings were given to the existing words. The words were selected with discretion and linguistic craftsmanship was exercized in the construction of sentences: It was for the first time in the history of Punjabi that planned development of the language was undertaken; in the earlier phases it was only natural development. Spoken Punjabi could not remain unaffected. The educated Punjabis tried to pronounce loan words in their original form, and this resulted in the borrowing of foreign sounds, /sh/ and (z) were the first to be adopted. PersoArabic /f/ and even /kh/` / gh/ were also pronounced by some Punjabis. Nasalization and tone increased considerably and are still increasing. A fairly large number of English words found place even in the language of nonliterate Punjabis. On the phonological level, tone is a significant phoneme of Punjabi, which distinguishes it from other NIA languages. No major Indian language, except Punjabi, has tone as a distinctive sound. The tone has affected the entire phonological structure of Punjabi. Tone has replaced the voiced aspirates /gh.jh, dh, dh, bh, /h/ in specific situations, and these voiced aspirates have very limited occurrence in the standard Punjabi today. Tone is still increasing and in many cases nondistinctive tone is also articulated these days. Similarly nasalization is also increasing, and vowels are nasalized, in some cases, where nasalization is not required according to grammar. For instance /dian/ (these women came) is pronounced as /anirian/ by all Punjabis although grammatically only the final /an/ should be nasalized. The fricatives /sh/ and /z/ are now pronounced almost by all speakers; the frequency of /f/ is increasing, and on the contrary Arabic /kh/ and /gh/ are disappearing from the speech of the new generation. Very few consonant clusters can be heard in the language spoken by the masses. The short vowels are n
ot articulated in wordfinal position. Grammatically Punjabi is, on the whole, an analytical language, though it still retains some of the synthetic characteristics. Suffixes of instrumental, ablative and locative cases are used with some nouns. In addidon to these, vocative forms of all human nouns can be formed with the help of suffixes, and there are separate suffixes according to number and gender. There are two numbers, singular and plural, and two genders, masculine and feminine. Every noun in Punjabi is assigned to one of the two genders. The verb agrees with the subject according to gender and number, and in a few cases according to person and number. But if the verbal form contains the past participle of a transitive verb, the verb agrees with the object. The tense is mostly decided by the auxiliary verb, which comes after the main verb. There are very few verbal forms in which the auxiliary verb does not occur. Compounding of verbal forms is a common feature. The verbal form baithd hoid si (was sitting) contain past participle of two verbs in addition to the auxiliary si (was); they are baith (sit), and ho (be). In some cases three verbs are compounded in a verbal form. Punjabi employs postpositions in place of the prepositions of English. For wordformation Punjabi mostly uses suffixes; prefixes are very few, and all have adjectival function. Again, more than one prefix does not occur in any word, whereas there can be three or even four suffixes in some words. Punjabi makes extensive use of reduplication which can be of varied forms. The same word can be repeated as in hauHhauli (slowly), two synonyms can come together as kdldsidh (jetblack), two antonyms may form a compound nikkdmotd (of ordinary nature); rhyming words may form a pairneretere (around). Punjabi has five degrees of proximity against two in English, Hindi, Urdu, etc. For English `this` Punjabi has three words expressing proximity on quite different basis. They are ah, (which is nearer to the first person and away from the second person), hah (which is closer to the second person, but away from the first person), and eh (close to both). For English `that` Punjabi has auh (away from both, but within sight) and oh farthest in time and space, not within sight. Since Punjabi is mainly an analytical language, wordorder in a sentence plays a significant role. The general order of a Punjabi sentence is subjectobjectverb, when the sentence has transitive verb, but the other words occur in the same order. The adjective precedes the noun it qualifies; with a pronoun the adjective is used normally in a predicative form only. In rare cases when an adjective qualifies a pronoun in an attributive form, it comes after the pronoun, as in he oh vichdrd (poor thing). The adverb also occurs before the verb it qualifies. The interrogative words, in normal construction, come immediately after the subject of the sentenceoh kadon did si (when did he come?) The shifting of the position of the interrogative element results in change in the sense of the sentence kadon did si oh, oh did kadon si have a connotation different from the earlier sentence. The auxiliarly verb comes after the main verb. If the verbal form is compound of two or more verbs, the auxiliary will occur after all components of the compound. Interrogative sentences are formed with the help of interrogative words, and there is no other change in the order of the sentence as in: mundd did si (the boy had come), mundd kion aia si (why did the boy come?), mundd kadon aid si (when did the boy come?) A change in the general order of the sentences changes the connotation kartdr kitdb parh rihd hai (Kartar is reading a book) is a general statement. If the question is who is reading the book?, the answer will be kartdr parh rihd hai kitdb; and if the question is what is Kartar doing?, the answer would be kitdb parh rihd hai kartdr. Punjabi is very rich in the vocabulary concerning the culture of ancient and medieval ages. It has most extensive kinship vocabulary. Most IndoAryan languages have separate words for uncle and aunt relations of different levels; for instance there are separate words for father`s brother, mother`s brother, husband of father`s sister, husband of mother`s sister, etc. Punjabi has the widest range in kinship vocabulary. In addition to separate names for relations like father`s sister, mother`s sister, brother`s wife, wife`s sister, etc, Punjabi has words for father of fatherinlaw, brother of fatherinlaw, father of motherinlaw, brother of motherinlaw, and also for the wives of all these male relations. The Lahndi dialect of Punjabi has separate names even for cousin category of kinship. Patreru is the son of father`s brother, and pitreri is daughter of father`s brother. Similarly there are independent names of sons and daughters of mother`s brother, mother`s sister, father`s sister. There is wide range of names of natural objects and their parts. A minute division of time is made and each division is given a name. The example of division of space has already been given while explaining the degree of proximity. There are three sparate pronouns for English `he` eh (he, who is close by), auh (he, who is bit away but is within sight), oh (he, who is far away, may not be within sight). Bui there is no distinction of gender in the pronouns in Punjabi and the same pronouns are used for `he`,`she` and `it`. There is a vast vocabulary concerning agriculturethe names of agri cultural implements and their parts, crops and their stems, leaves, fruits, and words for agricultural processes. In Lahndi, for example, there are five separate words for a drain paggun, khalsd, noli, kassi, wahd. Again, Punjabi has. a rich treasure of vocabulary pertaining to theology, mysticism and ethics. Because of political reasons, Punjabi could not develop, through natural process, the vocabulary concerning the scientific and technological subjects of modern civilization. The result was that when it was called upon to perform the duties of medium of instruction up to university level, and to act as the language of administration and polity, it found itself inadequately equipped for these responsibilities. Extensive borrowings were made to make up the deficiency. But that could not be enough, hence new terms were coined, existing words were given new connotation; new forms of old words were acquired through acceptable, and quite often, unacceptable grammatical process. The result of all these efforts was that Punjabi was forced to own many words, grammatical forms, idioms, and even phonemes which could not fit into the linguistic structure of this language. This situation still exists and the process of making old experiments still continues. The oldest specimens of Punjabi literature are preserved in the Guru Granth Sahib. In addition to these are poetic compositions of some saints, some vdrs (war ballads) and some qissds (narrative poetry). The same genres continued to be the main vehicles of literary expression during the seventeenth century. But, after the compilation of the Sikh scripture there is very little Punjabi poetry composed by the Sikhs, There are some poetical works, mostly dealing with Sikh history written by Sikh scholars, but Punjabi poetry of that century mainly came from the pens of Muslim poets. After the death of Guru Gobind Singh the Sikhs had to pass through a period of persecution and oppression for about seven decades; and later when they established their empire, they were throughout engaged in warfare. They had. as such, no time to devote to literary pursuits. This situation continued till the end of the Sikh rule in AD 1849. The Sikh literature produced during this period is mostly by the Nirmalas or the Udasis. These two sects had close links with the Hindu tradition, and were itinerant recluses who roamed through whole of northern India, preaching the message of the Sikh Gurus. They had, as such, to use a language which could be understood in any part of northern India. This language which is now labelled Sadhu Bhasha, was adopted by these Sikh writers. They used Sadhu Bhasha but wrote always in Gurmukhi scri
pt, which was originated by the Second Guru, Guru Angad, and had throughout remained specially associated with Sikhs and Sikhism. The Muslim Punjabi poets wrote their poetry in Persian script. Thus, Punjab, which was enriched by the sublime poetry of the Sikh Gurus, remained neglected by Sikh scholars almost till the last quarter of the nineteenth century. It was under the influence and guidance of the Singh Sabha (founded in 1873) that the Sikhs declared Punjabi as their language and Gurmukhi its script. The Punjab was divided into two parts, the eastern part, remaining in India and the western going to Pakistan in 1947. The Sikhs who had en masse migrated to the Indian Punjab, wanted that Punjabi should be declared the official language of Punjab which demand was not accepted by government. The whole of India was divided into unilingual states, but not the Punjab. The Sikhs had to resort to a longdrawn struggle to have their claim accepted. Punjabi is now prospering, and nonSikhs including a fairly large number of Hindus are amongst the leading scholars and writers of Punjabi. After Independence Urdu was declared the official language of Pakistan. The Punjabis of Pakistan after some time realized that they had made an error in discarding their mother tongue, Punjabi. They made concentrated efforts to get recognition for Punjabi at least as the State language. Some facilities for teaching in schools and colleges were granted. Punjabi is being taught up to M.A. level at the Panjab University. The Department of Punjabi at Panjab University, Lahore, is the publisher of a literary magazine. Magazines have also come up through private enterprise. Poetry and prose have splurged. But government support for Punjabi is meagre. Punjabi, in Pakistan, has not acquired the prestige and influence which belongs to it as a major language in the country.

The Sikh Encyclopedia

This website based on Encyclopedia of Sikhism by Punjabi University , Patiala by Professor Harbans Singh.