Sant Baba Harnam Singh Jiਸੰਤ ਬਾਬਾ ਹਰਨਾਮ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ

Sant Baba Harnam Singh Ji (July 1897 to 4 January 1983) was a twentieth-century Sikh saint who founded Gurdwara Rampur Khera Sahib near Garhdiwala in Hoshiarpur district. A Brahmgiani known for Naam Simran and seva, he turned a deserted mound people feared into one of Doaba's best known centres of Gurmat.

Who was Sant Baba Harnam Singh Ji?

He was born in July 1897 in Dhugga Kalan, a village in Dasuya tehsil of Hoshiarpur district, to Bhai Accher Singh and Mata Narain Kaur, a farming family. He had four brothers and two sisters. His parents died while he was still young, and he worked with his brothers in the fields, growing wheat and other crops. He had no formal schooling, since schools stood only in distant towns, but he learned Gurmukhi from the granthi of the village gurdwara until he could read Gurbani fluently. From childhood he said he would become a sant and live by the path of Guru Nanak Dev Ji.

He is not to be confused with two other well known saints who share his first name: Baba Isher Singh Ji of Rara Sahib and Baba Ishar Singh Ji of Nanaksar Kaleran. Sant Baba Harnam Singh Ji is the saint of Rampur Khera, in the Doaba region of Punjab, and his life belongs to the twentieth century, not to the time of the Gurus. His biography, written by his successor, is called Se Kinehiya?, which asks in Punjabi what kind of person he was.

How did a village boy become a saint?

His parents arranged his marriage when he was eight years old, to Bibi Gian Kaur. Within a year, before she had even come to live at Dhugga, she caught the plague and died. When his parents spoke of arranging a second marriage, he refused it with conviction, and he remained unmarried for the rest of his life. From that point he gave himself wholly to the Guru's path.

An Udasi sadhu named Santokh Das came to the village, and Baba Ji served him for eleven years, carrying food and water and sitting in his company. One day, when Baba Ji asked him who he really was, the sadhu told him to put dirt on his head and become his servant. Baba Ji answered that he was a Sikh and would not become a servant to any living person, and he left him. He then went looking for Sikh saints who had found God, but every one of them would teach him only if he became their chela. He concluded that the Shabad is the Guru, took the shelter of Guru Granth Sahib Ji, and took Amrit when he was twenty-one. He spent six months in Mool Mantar jaap at Anandpur Sahib.

Why did he settle on a deserted mound?

The family had moved from Dhugga to Sargodha, in what is now Pakistan, where Chak No 119 became a centre for lovers of Naam. After the Partition of 1947 the family moved to Rajasthan. While he was there, deep in meditation, Baba Ji was blessed with the darshan of Guru Gobind Singh Ji, who told him to go to his own part of Punjab and spread Gurmat, and to settle on a piece of deserted land four or five miles north of his village. He saw the exact place in his meditation: ten or twelve thick trees over rough, empty ground, with no house and nothing to eat.

In 1949 he came to the place. With Gurbaksh Singh and a few others he dug a small mud cave, a kachhi gufa, big enough for a bed, and he began a forty-day recitation of the Mool Mantar. His day began at two in the morning: after his bath he did his Nitnem, then Sukhmani Sahib, then thirty-two malas of the Mool Mantar, and in the evening Rehras Sahib and Sohila before he returned to his meditation. Gurbaksh Singh brought him food at midday.

The biography tells of his first nights on the mound, which local people believed was haunted. A Muslim fakir came and claimed the land was his, then a dreadlocked sadhu, and then a crowd of apparitions, and each one left when they found their powers had no effect on him. On the second night, when Maya came towards him, he fell at the Guru's feet in Ardaas, and Guru Amar Das Ji blessed him with darshan. The place was named Rampur Khera, since Rampur means the Lord who is everywhere. Within months the weekly Naam Abhiaas Kamaaee Smagams were drawing thousands of seekers.

What did Baba Ji teach?

Naam Simran stood at the centre of everything he taught. He told seekers to rise early, keep Nitnem, recite the Mool Mantar, and let the Name settle in the mind through the day. He taught that Guru Granth Sahib Ji is the eternal Guru, that the Shabad is the Guru, and that there is no need to take a living human being as a guru. He lived the old teaching of Bhagat Namdev Ji, to work with the hands while the mind stays with God, and he worked in the fields alongside his brothers even as he meditated. Humility ran through all of it: he dressed plainly, in a normal turban and simple clothes, and he asked for nothing.

From Vaisakhi 1976 to Vaisakhi 1979 he meditated and did Ardaas for the whole Khalsa Panth to remain in Chardi Kala, high spirits, through the years of the Emergency in India. Great saints of his time came to meet him, among them Sant Baba Kartar Singh Ji Khalsa Bhindranwale and Sant Baba Jarnail Singh Ji Khalsa Bhindranwale, who were deeply impressed by his teachings. A religious procession was arranged at Gurdwara Rampur Khera Sahib to mark three hundred years since the martyrdom of Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji.

How did seva grow at Rampur Khera?

Langar began at the mound and never stopped. As the sangat grew, Baba Ji arranged for roads, bridges and buildings to be built, gave generous help to Khalsa schools and colleges, and helped poorer students from the area to get a higher education and find work in government and teaching. Free eye camps and free medical facilities were set up for the needy, and the work was paid for by Baba Ji and the sangat together.

That work continues today under his successor, Sant Baba Sewa Singh Ji. The gurdwara now runs permanent allopathic and homeopathic clinics, a centre for eye treatment with modern facilities, an old age care home, a kirtan vidyala, and a training institute for Sikh preachers, all of them free to anyone who needs them. The campus stands as a living example of the Gurbani line that where the Lord's Name is chanted with love, that place becomes like a golden palace.

What happened in his last days?

In 1982, at the age of eighty-five and in poor health, Baba Ji joined the Dharam Yudh Morcha. Sant Baba Jarnail Singh Ji tried to persuade him not to go to jail because of his age, but Baba Ji went with thousands of his followers, courted arrest, and supported the morcha with money. While he was in jail he baptised many Sikhs. The harsh conditions in jail worsened his health, and although he was given expert medical treatment, he died on 4 January 1983 at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi. At his Antim Ardaas he was honoured as a Shaheed.

His spiritual successor, Sant Baba Sewa Singh Ji, took charge of Rampur Khera and published the biography Se Kinehiya?, along with other books from Baba Ji's teachings. Baba Ji is remembered in Doaba as a Brahmgiani who asked for nothing, gave everything away, and turned a place people feared into a place where thousands still come to sit, listen and serve.

How can I visit Gurdwara Rampur Khera today?

Gurdwara Rampur Khera Sahib stands in the Gondpur area near Garhdiwala, about twenty-eight kilometres from Hoshiarpur towards Dasuya on the main highway. Its white marble Darbar Sahib rises with a multi-tiered tower crowned by a lotus-finial dome, smaller onion domes and delicate chhatris, around a wide central courtyard, with a tall Nishan Sahib that can be seen from the road. The complex also has a langar hall, sarai blocks for pilgrims, and the free clinics and eye hospital.

Weekly Naam Abhiaas Smagams are still held here, and seekers come from India and abroad for spiritual guidance, kirtan and Guru ka Langar. The biggest gatherings fall on Baba Ji's Barsi, his death anniversary, and on special smagams through the year. The gurdwara welcomes everyone, whether they come for peace, for free medical help, or simply for a meal of langar.