BAVANJA KAVI, lit. fifty-two poets, is how the galaxy of poets and scholars who attended on Guru Gobind Singh (1666-1708) is popularly designated. Guru Gobind Singh, Nanak X, prophet and soldier, was an accomplished poet and also a great patron of letters. According to Sarup Das Bhalla, Mahima Prakash, he

CHANDRA SAIN SAINAPATI, commonly referred to as Sainapati and counted among the "fifty-two poets" of Guru Gobind Singh (1666-1708), was the son of Bal Chand, an educated Man Jatt of Lahore. His original name was Chandra Sain, Sainapati being the pseudonym he had taken. Chandra Sain, taught by one

DEVA SINGH NAROTAM, PANDIT (d. 1924), Nirmala scholar, was the son of Mahitab Singh of the village of Janetpura, 13 km north of Jagraori (30° 47`N, 75° 28`E), in Ludhiana district of the Punjab. He received his early lessons in the Sikh texts at the hands of Bhai Gurdit

DATU, BABA (1537-1628), son of Guru Angad and Mata Khivi, was born in 1537 at Khadur Sahib in present day Amritsar district of the Punjab. Like his elder brother, Dasu, he too was not reconciled to Guru Amar Das succeeding his father as Guru. But whereas Dasu had soon

GIAN PRABODH (Guide to Enlightenment), included in Guru Gobind Singh`s Dasam Granth, is a long poem in Braj employing sixteen different metres. It comprises two independent pans, the first, i.e. the introductory one (stanzas 1 to 125), beginning with laudation of the Almighty who is depicted as Supreme, beyond

GURMAT (gurmat, mat, Sanskrit mati, i.e. counsel or tenets of the Guru, more specifically the religious principles laid down by the Guru) is a term which may in its essential sense be taken to be synonymous with Sikhism itself. It covers doctrinal, prescriptive and directional aspects of Sikh faith and

HIKAYAT is the title given to the eleven tales, in Persian verse but in Gurmukhi letters, in the Dasam Granth, immediately after the Zafamamah. The title `Hikayat` does not occur in the actual text, but most of the tales have a verse, coming after two or three invocational lines

JASODA (YASODA) O Lord! Thou of Lotus-eyes, of Sweet Words, with whom million of companions look elegant, whom the mother Jasoda asks to eat cunry and rice..... (Swayye Mahle Chauthe Ke, p. 1402) Jasoda (Yasoda) was the foster-mother of Krishna and wifé of the cowherd Nanda. See : Krishna

MUL CHAND, BHAI father in law of Guru Nanak, was a Chona Khatri, resident of Batala, who looked after the lands of the Randhava Jatts of the village of Pakkhokc in present day Gurdaspur district of the Punjab. He had a daughter of marriageable age named Sulakkhani whom he betrothed

NAUNIDH, Bhandari Khatri of Agra, waited upon Guru Gobind Singh during his visit to the city in AD 1707. According to Bhai Santokh Singh, Sri Gur Pratdp Suraj Granth, he enquired about the reason for prescribing unshorn hair for the Sikhs. The Guru explained that keeping long hair was no

PAKHAR, BHAI, a carpenter of Bushehar, who, along with his sonJhanda, as says the Bdldjanam Sdkhl, received instruction at the hands of Guru Nanak at the time of his visit to their town, and became a devotee.