Introduction To The Book 'The Great Sikh Martyrs' By Piara Singh Data 

Guru Nanak equated love of God with love of man. He exhorted his followers to love God and serve fellow-beings. But love and service means giving ... giving away even oneself. It involves sacrifice. That is why Guru Nanak said, "If you  choose to tread the path of love come with your head on your palm (Baber Vani, Guru Granth Sahib, P. 1412).

The successive gurus lived upto the precepts propounded and practised by Guru Nanak. They gave worthy lead to their followers. They evolved institutions which promoted loving interaction among men of diverse status and background. They worked hard to demolish the barriers of caste with a view to promote ethnic equality of man. They harnessed the spirit of man in the service of society to make it conducive for spiritual generation.

Some of the latter gurus were in the vanguard of fight against the unjust social order and religious bigotry of the rulers of their times, which was causing untold misery and suffering to the hapless populace. They went to the battlefield with their heads on their palms. Guru Arjan Dev, the fifth Guru, was first of the Sikh martyrs. Why was he tortured and killed by the rulers of the day? He was seen as a rebel, a revolutionary and a threat to the establishment. He was accused of running a parallel government, of having set-up his own social order, and styling himself as Saccha Padshah (True King). Guru Hargobind, .the sixth guru, was incarcerated in Gwalior fort for full seven years on the same very charge.

Guru Tegh Bahadur, the ninth guru, achieved martyrdom fighting in defence of religious tolerance and freedom of conscience. He lived and died upholding those very basic human values which now form part of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The tenth guru, Gobind Singh, says in his autobiography that he had taken birth in this world with the sole purpose of "upholding the saints and destroying the wicked." True to his mission, he, together with his four young sons, died fighting the wicked to uphold dharma.

Not much before his martyrdom, Guru Gobind Singh had created a missionary class called Khalsa and only those could qualify to be members of this class, who offered their heads to the Guru and his cause. To begin with, only five of the young candidates came forward with offer of their heads; later, of course, lakhs joined the Guru's elitist class. The upshot of all this is that the qualifying requisite for seeking membership of the Khalsa was the acceptance of martyrdom. The very concept of Khalsa was based on martyrdom itself. Of course, the Khalsa has other characteristics too, incorporating the traditional ones, such as that Khalsa is ccmmitted to uphold social values; Khalsa is committed to oppose oppression and tyranny. A Khalsa was to be a saint­soldier. Khalsa was designed to be a revolutionary force. A revolutionary force indeed it has been in history. After Guru Gobind Singh, came Banda Bahadur, who was suitably indoctrinated in the Khalsa creed and mission. From Nander in the south he came like an hurricane in Punjab and received the boon of martyrdom only after he had extirpated many of the wicked people and demolished many a citadel of evil. He brought cheer to many a poor, oppressed and downtrodden people and ruin to their exploiters and habitual offenders.

After Banda Bahadur, we find common folk carrying on the struggle even on individual levels without the benefit of army to fight for them. These individuals took on the State's repressive machinery not in the faintest hope that they would come out victors in the grossly unequal contest but that it was Khalsa's duty and character to miss no opportunity to fight down the evil to uphold dharma.

A notable example of this class of Khalsa are Bhai Bota Singh and Garja Singh who one day stood in the middle of the road and levied tax on every passing cart and donkey at a time when the rulers had offered a lucrative price for every Sikh head. They courted martyrdom as if nothing better could be achieved  in this life. You will find many Bota Singhs and Garja Singhs who trod the path of love and service with their heads on their palms in the following pages.