NITNEM (nit: daily; nem; practice, rule or regimen) is the name given to the set prayers which every Sikh is commanded to say daily, alone or in company. These prayers or texts are five in number for early morning Guru Nanak`sJa/w and Guru Gobind Singh`s Jdpu and Savaiyye, for the

PARTAP SINGH. GIANI (1855-1920), Sikh school-man and calligraphist, was born in 1855, the son of Bhai Bhag Singh Giani of Lahore. As a young boy, Partap Singh learnt Punjabi, Urdu and Sanskrit and studied Sikh Scriptures. In 1884, he accompanied Thakur Singh Sandhanvalia to England to read the Guru Granth

PRIKHIA PRAKARAN (printed = test; prakaran = part or fragment) by Pandit Tara Singh Narotam is a small tract, bound with the author`s more famous Gurumat Nimaya Sdgar, endevouring to establish the authenticity or otherwise of the authorship of the various Sikh texts including the Guru Granth Sahib, the Dasam

RAMRAIAS, originally a splinter sect of the Sikhs, now comprise an independent group more akin to the Udasis. The sect owes its origin to Baba Ram Rai, whose name it bears. Ram Rai, who was the elder son of Guru Har Rai (1630-61), the seventh Guru, and who had

SAHIB SINGH BEDl, BABA (1756-1834), tenth in direct descent from Guru Nanak, was much revered in Sikh times for his piety as well as for his martial prowess. He was born at Dera Baba Nanak, Gurdaspur district on Chet. Sudi 5,1813 Bk/5 April 1756. Around 1770, his parents Baba

SANTA SINGH JATHEDAR, BHAI (1897-1921), shahid of Nankana Sahib, was the son of Bhai Nand Singh and Mat Prem Kaur of Darauli village in Jalandhar district. They were weavers by profession. Santa Singh`s grandfather, GuJjar Singh, as well as his father had received the vows of the Khalsa. The family

SIANA SAYYIDAN, a village in Kurukshetra district of Haryana 5 km from Pehowa (29"59`N, 76"35`E), is the birthplace of Sayyid Shah Bhikh or Bhikhan Shah, a Muslim saint, who guided by intuition and divine inspiration, had gone to pay obeisance to the child Gobind at Lakhnaur in 1670. There

SULTANPUR LODHI (3P13N, 7512E), old town in Kapurthala district of the Punjab, where Guru Nanak put up for several years before setting out on his travels to deliver his message. In this town lived his sister, Bibi Nanaki, and her husband, Jai Ram, an official in the service of

TALVARA, locally known as RampurTalvara because of its close proximity to a village called Rampur, lies near Sri Hargobindpur (31041`N, 75029`E) in Gurdaspur district of the Punjab. It claims a historical shrine, Gurdwara Damdama Sahib, dedicated to Guru Hargobind, who is said to have preached here after the batttle

UJAGAR SINGH, BHAI (1902-1921), one of the Nankana Sahib martyrs, was born on 10 June 1902, the son of Bhai Jagat Singh and Mat Dial Kaur of Chakk 64 Bandala Nihaloana in Lyallpur (now Faisalabad) district of Pakistan. He learnt Gurmukhi at the village gurdwara and was able fluently to

VISAKHA SINGH, SANT (1905-1968), holy preacher of the Sikh faith, was born at the village of Janetpura, in Ludhiana district, on 13 April 1903, the son of Karam Singh and Kahn Kaur, though most of his adult life was spent at Kishanpura, in Firozpur district. He had his early

ALAMGIR, a village in Ludhiana district, 13 km to the southwest of the city (30°54\'N, 75°52\'E), is famed for its Gurdwara Manji Sahib Patshahi 10. Guru Gobind Singh made a halt in the village as he was travelling after the battle of Chamkaur in December 1705. Here the Guru