MAYYA SINGH, BHAI (1862-1928). spelt as Maya Singh in contemporary English writings, was a leading figure in the Singh Sabha awakening. He was born in 1862. Little is known about his early life, except that after his school years he joined the railways at Lahore as a clerk. There

PREM SINGH HOTI, BABA (1882-1954), historian and biographer, was born on 2 November 1882 at Hoti, near Mardan, in North-West Frontier Province, now part of Pakistan. His father Ganda Singh, a man of means, traced his ancestry back to Bhalla family of Goindval, in Amritsar district, to which noted Sikh

SEVA SINGH KRIPAN BAHADUR (1890-1961), Akali activist and newspaper editor, was the son of Bhai Harnam Singh and Mai Prem Kaur of Bakhtgarh, village 18 km northwest of Barnala (30"22`N, 75"32`E), in Sangrur district of the Punjab. Born in 1890, he received lessons in Punjabi and in scripture reading in

Seetal, Sohan Singh entered the field of literary creation after 1947. He has written over a score novels most of which are romantic and sentimental. Among these Dive di Lo (The Flame of the Earthen Lamp), Mul da Mas (Flesh at a Price) and Badia (Revenge) deal with the

Singh, Nanak, the father of Punjabi novel, was born at Peshawar. Like most Hindu families in the West Punjab in those days, Nanak Singh\'s parents were devoted to the Sikh faith. Their son, Hans Raj, embraced Sikhism under the influence of the Singh Sabha Movement of the early twenties

THOMAS, JACOB, son of the celebrated 18th century adventurer and soldier of fortune, George Thomas, an Irish sailor who had carved out a small kingdom for himself in the wastelands of Haryana. Jacob Thomas was in the service of Begam Samru before he joined Maharaja Ranjit Singh`s army in

ASRARISAMADI, a Persian chronicle by an anonymous writer who is now identified as Munshi Jot Prakash attached to the court of Nawab Abd us Samad Khan, the governor of Lahore from 1713 to 1726. Written around 1728, the work. which the author claims to be an eyewitness account of

Bhagwan Singh (1850 - 1902) born in the village of Marajh, now in district Bhatinda in 1850,has given the story of Heer a popular rural colour characteristic of the Malwa or the southern region of Punjab. It is written in the classical Kabit form in the Hindu tradition. Sohni

GANDA SINGH (d. 1845), of Butala, in Gujranwala district of undivided Punjab, was a soldier in the Sikh army. Early in his career, he was assigned by Maharaja Ranjit Singh to Prince Sher Singh`s troops. Ganda Singh`s father, Dharam Singh, had also served in the army and taken part

GURCHARAN SINGH Gurcharan Singh (1917 - ) is an eminent Punjabi creative writer in the domains of fiction and poetry. He was born in a Kambaj Rajput family. He passed his M.A. in English (1940) Honours in Punjabi (1950) and M.A. in Punjabi in 1953 and was awarded Ph.D.

Joshi, Mohinder Singh, an eminent short story writer, was born in 1919. Since, he belongs to the legal profession, Justice Joshi\'s characters are clearly delineated, plots painfully constructed and the language assiduously polished. His dialogues are measured; the protagonists speaking not a phrase more than that what is absolutely

MOHAN SINGH VAID, BHAI. (1881-1936), apothecary, writer, collector of books and social reformer, was born at Tarn Taran on Phagun sudil, 1937 Bk/7 March 1881, the youngest of the four sons of Bhai Jaimal Singh (1843-1919), who too was a void (practitioner of  Ayurveda or Indian system of medicine) of