guru

UDDOKE, a village about 10 km from Batala (31"49`N, 75"12`E), on the boundary between Amritsar and Gurdaspur districts of the Punjab, is sacted to Guru Nanak, who stayed here on his way to Batala, where he got married in September 1487. Uddoke is in fact divided into two villages, Uddoke Khurd and Uddoke Kalan, without a distinct line to separate them. The shrine dedicated to Guru Nanak is in Uddoke Khurd which falls in Amritsar district, the other part lying in the district of Gurdaspur. According to Sri Guru Tirath Sangrahi by Tara Singh Narotam, the bridegroom here performed the ceremony of cutting a twig from a Jand tree.

VALLA, village 7 km east of Amritsar (31°38`N, 74°53`E) along the Amritsar Sri Hargobindpur road, is sacred to Guru Tegh Bahadur, who visited here in November 1664. According to Bhai Santokh Singh, Sri Gur Pratap Sura/` Granth, the Guru had come on a visit to the Harimandar, Amritsar, but the masands or ministrants shut the doors against him. Guru Tegh Bahadur sat outside the Harimandar for some time and departed saying, "The masands of Amritsar are burning with die fire of ambition," and came to Valla where he sat under a pipal tree, outside die village.

VIGAH MALL, BHAl, of Sultanpur Lodhi now in Kapurthala district of the Punjab, embraced Sikh faith during the time of Guru Amar Das. He lived up to the time of Guru Arjan and once visited him in Amritsar with the sangat of Sultanpur to receive instruction from him. His name figures in Bhai Gurdas, Varan, XI. 21.

ZAFARNAMAH SAHIB - It is a Gurdwara, at village Dialpura Bhai Ka, built in the memory of the visit by Guru Gobind Singh Sahib. According to a local tradition, it is here that Guru Sahib wrote Zafarnamah (literally: letter of victory); hence the name of the Gurdwara.

ADI GRANTH. See SRI GURU GRANTH SAHIB

AJAIB, BHAI, a Sangha Jatt who embraced the Sikh faith in the time of Guru Arjan. He belonged to the village of Darauli Bhai, in presentday Faridkot district. Two of his brothers, Umar Shah and Ajab, were the Guru`s masands or vicars. Bhai Ajaib took part in seva, voluntary labour of hands, at the time of digging of the Amritsar pool and construction of the Harimandar. See AJAB, BHAI

AKAR, a village in the interior of Patiala district, possesses a historical shrine called Gurdwara Nim Sahib. The Gurdwara commemorates the visit of Guru Tegh Bahadur who, during one of his journeys through the Malva territory, put up here near a mm (margosa) tree, which still exists. The leaves of one of the boughs of this tree which leans over the shrine are tasteless while those on the rest of the tree possess their natural bitter taste. The miracle is attributed to Guru Tegh Bahadur, who is said to have pulled off a twig from this branch and used it to cleanse his teeth.

ALI SINGH (d. 1716), a native of the village of Salaudi, near Sirhind, was in the service of Wazir Khan, the Mughal faujdar of Sirhind. According to Ratan Singh Bharigu, Prachin Panth Prakash, Wazir Khan, on learning of Banda Singh\'s advance from the South towards the Punjab under the orders of Guru Gobind Singh, called Ali Singh to his presence and taunted him with the remark that another Guru of theirs had appeared and that he should join him and bring him to Sirhind to be despatched after the previous Guru\'s sons.

ASCETICISM, derived from the Greek word askesis, connotes the `training` or `exercise` of the body and the mind. Asceticism or ascetic practices belong to the domain of religious culture, and fasts, pilgrimages, ablutions, purificatory rituals, vigils, abstinence from certain foods and drinks, primitive and strange dress, nudity, uncut hair, tonsure. shaving the head, circumcision, caved welling, silence, meditation, vegetarianism, celibacy, virginity, inflicting pain upon oneself by whips and chains, mutilation, begging alms, owning no wealth or possessions, forbearance and patience, equanimity or impartiality towards friends and foes, eradication of desires and passions, treating the body as something evil or treating human life as a means of achieving ultimate release or union with God all these are subsumed under ascetic practices.

ANI RAI, author of Jangnama Guru Gobind Singh Ji, was one of the numerous poets and scholars who enjoyed the patronage of Guru Gobind Singh (1666-1708). The Jangnama is an account in verse of a battle on the banks of the River Sutlej in which an attack from the imperial troops was countered and repulsed by Sikhs under the personal command of Guru Gobind Singh. No date is given of the event, but a reference in the text to "Khalsa," inaugurated in 1699, and other details indicate that it was one of the last battles of Anandpur.