Sirhindਸਰਹਿੰਦ

History

Sirhind's name is popularly derived from 'Sar-i Hind' — the frontier of Hind — for it stood as the Mughals' gateway to Hindustan. Its antiquity runs deep: Varahamihira's sixth-century Brihat Samhita mentions it as Satudar Desh, and the Chinese pilgrim Xuanzang called it the capital of the Shitotulo (Sutlej) district in the seventh century. Under the Mughals it became a provincial capital controlling the Lahore–Delhi highway; European travellers wrote admiringly of its splendour, and Sirhind gave its name to the entire Malwa region's Mughal administration.

The city's defining tragedy came in December 1704, when Wazir Khan, the Mughal governor of Sirhind, ordered Guru Gobind Singh's younger sons — Zorawar Singh (9) and Fateh Singh (7) — and their grandmother Mata Gujri bricked alive for refusing to convert. The outrage shaped Sikh history: in 1710 Banda Singh Bahadur stormed Sirhind and executed Wazir Khan, and in 1764 the Dal Khalsa defeated the governor Zain Khan and occupied the city, which then passed to Baba Ala Singh and became part of Patiala State. Today Sirhind is the twin city of Fatehgarh Sahib, whose municipal council sits here.

Geography & people

Sirhind lies on the Grand Trunk Road between Ludhiana and Ambala, about 26 kilometres from Rajpura, with a railway junction on the Delhi–Amritsar line from which the Sirhind–Una line branches off. The 2011 census recorded 58,097 residents in the municipal council, with a literacy rate of about 90 per cent — among the highest in the region. Punjabi and the Puadhi dialect are spoken.

Places of interest

Gurdwara Fatehgarh Sahib, at the adjoining town, commemorates the younger Sahibzadas and Mata Gujri with the great Shaheedi Jor Mela each December. In Sirhind itself stand remarkable Mughal remains: the Aam Khas Bagh, a roadside garden-serai complex; the Rauza Sharif, the mausoleum of the Sufi saint Shaikh Ahmad Sirhindi (d. 1624); and the elegant paired tombs of Ustad and Shagird, the master architect and his pupil. The town's old serais and mosques recall its centuries as a highway capital.

Notable people

Wazir Khan, the governor whose cruelty made Sirhind infamous in Sikh memory, was executed here by Banda Singh Bahadur in 1710. The younger Sahibzadas, Zorawar Singh and Fateh Singh, and Mata Gujri are the city's immortal martyrs. Shaikh Ahmad Sirhindi, the Naqshbandi Sufi reformer known as Mujaddid Alf Thani, lies buried at the Rauza Sharif and drew disciples from across the Islamic world.