Anandpur Sahibਅਨੰਦਪੁਰ ਸਾਹਿਬ

History

Anandpur Sahib, the City of Bliss, was founded in 1665 by Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji, the ninth Sikh Guru, who first established it as Chak Nanaki. Set against the Shivalik foothills near the Sutlej river, in what is the Puadh region of Rupnagar district, it became the home of the last two Sikh Gurus. Guru Gobind Singh Ji spent some twenty-five years here, and it was from Anandpur that he shaped the Sikh community into the Khalsa.

On Vaisakhi day, 13 April 1699, Guru Gobind Singh Ji called a great gathering at Kesgarh and founded the Khalsa Panth, baptising the first five beloved ones, the Panj Pyare, with amrit. The event gave the Sikh community its distinct identity, its code of conduct and its spirit of courage and equality, and it remains the defining moment of the town's history. To defend the growing community against the Mughals and the hostile rajas of the hill states, the Guru ringed Anandpur with a chain of defensive forts, the qilas of Kesgarh, Anandgarh, Lohgarh, Holgarh, Fatehgarh and Taragarh.

The town also carries the memory of sacrifice. When Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji was executed in Delhi in 1675 for defending the right to worship, his head was brought to Anandpur by Bhai Jaita, and Gurdwara Sis Ganj Sahib marks the place where it was cremated. Anandpur thus holds both the martyrdom of the ninth Guru and the birth of the Khalsa under the tenth, the two poles of Sikh history.

Takht Kesgarh Sahib

At the centre of this sacred landscape stands Takht Kesgarh Sahib, one of the five takhts, the seats of authority in Sikhism. The gurdwara marks the very ground where the Khalsa was born, and its halls display weapons associated with Guru Gobind Singh Ji. Pilgrims climb the cobbled path to the shrine, cross the Darshani Deorhi and gather in the great marbled quadrangle, and the sarovar beside it remains a place of prayer and reflection.

Hola Mohalla and today

Every spring Anandpur Sahib hosts Hola Mohalla, the largest annual gathering in Sikhism, when hundreds of thousands of devotees arrive for days of prayer, processions and displays of martial skill. The town is also home to the Virasat-e-Khalsa museum, a striking modern building that traces five centuries of Sikh history and Punjabi culture. For Sikhs across the world, Anandpur Sahib is second to no place in sanctity: the birthplace of the Khalsa, and a town whose every street carries the memory of the tenth Guru.