CHIKA, an old village in Kaithal district of Haryana, 26 km west of Pehova (29° 59`N, 76° 35`E), is sacred to Guru Hargobind and Guru Tegh Bahadur. The former passed through Chika at the time of his visit to Kurukshetra in 1638. Guru Tegh Bahadur arrived here from Samana

DIVALI, festival of lights (from Sanskrit dipamala or dipavali meaning row of lamps or nocturnal illumination), is observed all over India on amavasya, the last day of the dark half of the lunar month of Kartika (October-November). Like other seasonal festivals, Divali has been celebrated since time immemorial. In its

DIVAN CHAND. MISR (d. 1825), a general in Maharaja Ranjit Singh`s army, was the son of a Brahman shopkeeper of the village of Gondlanvala, in Gujranwala district, now in Pakistan. He had come to the notice of Maharaja Ranjit Singh in 1812 during one of his tours and was

DIVAN SINGH MAFTOON (1890-1974) was in his day the most talked about editor in Urdu journalism. Born in the Punjab he migrated to Delhi in the early twenties. His sole asset was a smattering of Urdu. Gradually, he grew in his command of the language and became known for

DIVAN SINGH, BHAI (1888-1921), one of the Nankana Sahib martyrs, was born in 1888, the son of Bhai Hira Singh and Mat Pan Kaur of Pandori Nij[jaran, in Jalandhar district. The family later shifted to Chakk No. 91 Dhannuana, in the newly colonized district of Lyallpur, now in Pakistan.

DIVAN SINGH, BHAI (d. 1924), one of the martyrs of Jaito Morcha, was born around 1874, the son of Sahib Singh of the village of Mahingarval in Hoshiarpur district of the Punjab. As he grew up, he joined government service in the railways and was an assistant engineer when

NARLI, village barely one kilometre from the Indo Pakistan border in Amritsar district of the Punjab, claims a historical shrine, Gurdwara Manji Sahib which commemorates one of the manjis or preaching centres established by Guru Amar Das (1479-1574), The first preacher appointed here by the Guru was Bhai Mai

RAIKOT (300 N, 75°37`E), a municipal town in Ludhiana district, is sacred to Guru Gobind Singh. He came here on the invitation of Rai Kalha, the local Muslim chief, and encamped under a shisham or tahli tree at the site of Gurdwara Tahliana Sahib, 1.5 km to the west

SOBHA SINGH, a grandson of Divan Singh who had built the village of Qila Divan Singh in Gurdaspur district during the early days of Sikh power. Divan Singh was a follower of Chatthas of Rasulnagar. Sobha Singh`s father, Hukam Singh had served under Mahan Singh Sukkarchakkia and afterwards under

ANANTNAG (33° 44`N, 75° 13`E), a district town on the southern edge of the Kashmir valley, is named after a nearby spring which is regarded as sacred by the Hindus. The town claims a historical Sikh shrine commemorating the visit of Guru Nanak (1469-1539), who passed through here on his

BAKAPUR DIVAN, a largely attended religious assembly (divan) of the Sikhs, held on 1314June 1903 at Bakapur, a small village 3 km from Phillaur railway station in the Punjab, marked a high point in Singh Sabha resurgence, The occasion was the conversion to Sikhism of Maulawi Karim Bakhsh, born