LAKHNAUR, 10 km south of Ambala City (30"23`N, 76"47`E), was the ancestral village of Mata Gujari, mother of Guru Gobind Singh. Returning in 1670 to Patna after his long eastern journey, Guru Tegh Bahadur asked his family to travel straight to Lakhnaur, while he himself made a detour and went

BAHORU, BHAI, a Khosia Khatri of Lahore, received initiation at the hands of Guru Arjan. As Bhai Bidhi Chand in Guru Hargobind`s time went to Lahore to rescue the second of the two horses belonging to Bhai Karori, a horse dealer of Kabul, who was bringing the pair as

DUNI CHAND, grandson of the well known Bhai Salho (d. 1628), a Dhalival Jatt of Majitha in Amritsar district in the Punjab, was a masand of the Guru`s nominee in the Majha area. A hefty man of immense bulk, Duni Chand led out a band of 500 warriors to

KESARI CHAND, Raja of Jasvan, a tiny hill state situated in the foothills of the Sivaliks. Besides being a close relation, he was a confidant and ally of Raja Bhim Chand of Kahlur, who once deputed him to Anandpur to seek from Guru Gobind Singh the loan of an

MUHKAM CHAND, DIWAN (1750-1814), a renowned Sikh army general of the early years of Maharaja Ranjit Singh`s reign, was born around AD 1750. Son of a small shopkeeper, Baisakhi Mall Khatri, of Kunjah, a village in Gujrat district, now in Pakistan, he trained as an accountant and served as a

RANJIT NAGARA, lit. the drum of victory in battlefield, was the name given the kettledrum installed by Guru Gobind Singh at Anandpur in 1684. Nagdrd, Punjabi for the Persian naqqdrah meaning a kettledrum, was a symbol of royalty. As well as fulfilling his spiritual office, Guru Gobind Singh had, like

TARA CHAND, DIWAN (d. 1858), son of Diwan Karam Chand, entered the Sikh service in 1822. His first employment was in Peshawar under Diwan Kirpa Ram. He was sent in the following year to Kangra, with civil and military authority, to collect the revenues, and in 1832 was tranferred

BAKHT MALL and Tara Chand, masands or accredited Sikh preachers in Kabul, once ledr the sangat of their area to the Punjab to wait on Guru Hargobind (1595-1644). Among the offerings they brought were two pedigree horses of excelling beauty, named Gulbagh and Dilbagh. As they were passing through Lahore,

DHARAM CHAND, son of Lakhmi Chand and grandson of Guru Nanak. According to Gurbilas Patshahi Chhevin, he received Guru Hargobind when the latter, along with Bhai Gurdas and Bhai Bhana, went to Kartarpur which Guru Nanak had made his dwelling place during the last years of his life. Dharam

KHUSHAL CHAND, RAJA, or Khushal Rai (d. 1752), an official under the Mughal emperor Muhammad Shah (1719-48) and a writer and poet of some merit, described himself as a NanakpanthI, i.e. a follower of Guru Nanak, his father Jivan Ram, and grandfather, Anand Ram Kayastha, had also served in the

MUHKAM SINGH, BHAI (1663-1705). born Muhkam Chand, one of the Panj Piare or the Five Beloved of honoured memory in the Sikh tradition, was the son of TIrath Chand, a cloth printer of Dvaraka in Gujarat. About the year 1685, he came to Anandpur, then the seat of Guru