One of the major campaigns in the Sikhs' agitation in the early 1920's
for the reformation of their holy places. Guru ka Bagh in Ghukkevali
village, about 20 km from Amritsar, has two historic gurdwaras close
to each other, commemorating the visits respectively of Guru Arjan
in 1585 and Guru Tegh Bahadur in 1664. The latter is laid out on the
site of a bagh (garden) which gave the place its name. Like most other
gurdwaras, the management of these two had passed into the hands of
mahants or abbots belonging to the monastic order of Udasi Sikhs.
The grant of jagirs to such sacred places in Sikh times and the offerings
of the devotees had made the custodians wealthy and prone to luxury.
In 1921, one Sundar Das Udasi was the mahant of Guru ka Bagh. He
was indifferent to his ecclesiastical duties and lived a dissolute
life, squandering the-resources of the gurdwara. To save the shrine
from being occupied by reformist Sikhs, he however signed a formal
agreement with them on 31 January 1921, promising to make a new
start and receive the rites of Khalsa initiation and to serve under
an eleven member committee appointed by the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak
Committee. But seeing how the government was everywhere supporting
the mahants, he repudiated part of the agreement and said that,
though he had surrendered the gurdwara to the Shiromani Committee,
the piece of land known as Guru ka Bagh attached to it was still
his property.
He objected to Sikhs cutting down for the langar (gurdwara kitchen)
firewood from that land. The police, willing to oblige him, arrested
on 9 August 1922 five Sikhs on charges of trespass. The following
day the arrested persons were hurriedly tried and sentenced to six
months rigorous imprisonment. This sparked off the agitation, and
the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee decided to send every
day a batch of five Sikhs to chop firewood from the grove of trees
, on the land of Gurdwara Guru ka Bagh and court arrest if prevented
from doing so. From 22 August, police began to arrest jathas on
charges of theft, riot and criminal trespass. The arrests gave a
fillip to the movement and more and more Sikhs came forward to join
protest. On 25 August, Amavas day, the gathering was so large that
S.G.M. Beatty, Additional Superintendent of Police, ordered the
police to disperse it by a lathi-charge.

Sikhs being
beaten with long batons
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Government violence led the Shiromani Committee to increase the
size of the jathas. On 26 August the Deputy Commissioner of Amritsar
issued warrants for the arrest of eight members of the executive
of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee. A council of action,
headed by Teja Singh Samundri, now took over charge of the Akali
morcha. The government banned the assembling of people at Guru ka
Bagh, and police pickets were posted on roads and bridges to intercept
volunteers coming into Amritsar. Yet jathas of black-turbaned Akalis
chanting the sacred hymns reached the spot every day to be mercilessly
beaten by police until they fell to the ground to a man. This happened
from day to day. Political leaders, social workers and reporters
came to witness what was described as an ideally non-violent protest.
A.L. Verges, an American cinematographer, prepared a film of the
proceedings under the caption, Exclusive Picture of India's Martyrdom.
English missionary and educationist C.F. Andrews (1871-1940) visited
Guru ka Bagh and saw, as he put it,
"hundreds of Christs being crucified."
He sent to the Press a detailed report on what he witnessed on 12
September 1922:
"It was a sight which I never wish to
see again, a sight incredible to an Englishman. There were four
Akali Sikhs with black turbans facing a band of about a dozen policemen,
including two English officers... They were perfectly still and
did not move further forward. Their hands were placed together in
prayer and it was clear that they were praying. Then, without the
slightest provocation on their part, an Englishman lunged forward
the head of his lathi which was bound with brass. He lunged it forward
in such a way that his fist which held the staff struck the Akali
Sikh, who was praying, just at the collar bone with great force.
It looked the most cowardly blow as I saw it struck...
The blow which I saw was sufficient to fell the Akali Sikh and send
him to the ground. He rolled over and slowly got up once more, and
faced the same punishment over again. Time after time one of the
four who had gone forward was laid prostrate by repeated blows,
now from the English officer and now from the police who were under
his control. The others were knocked out more quickly... I saw with
my own eyes one of these police kick in the stomach a Sikh who stood
helplessly before him. For when one of the Akali Sikhs had been
hurled to the ground and was lying prostrate, a police sepoy stamped
with his foot upon him, using his full weight; the foot struck the
prostrate man between the neck and the shoulder.
The vow they had made to God was kept. I saw no act, no look, of
defiance. It was true martyrdom for them as they went forward, a
true act of faith, a true deed of devotion to God.
They believe intensely that their right to cut wood in the garden
of the Guru was an immemorial religious right, and this faith of
theirs is surely to be counted for righteousness, whatever a defective
and obsolete law may determine or fail to determine concerning legality..."
Sir Edward Maclagan, Lt-Governor of the Punjab, visited Guru ka
Bagh on 13 September 1922. Under his orders, the beating of the
volunteers was stopped. Mass arrests, imprisonments, heavy fines
and attachment of properties were resorted to. In the first week
of October, the Governor-General Lord Reading held discussions with
the Governor of the Punjab at Shimla to find a way out of the impasse.
The good offices of a wealthy retired engineer, Sir Ganga Ram, were
utilized to resolve the situation. Sir Ganga Ram acquired on lease,
on 17 November 1922, 524 kanals and 12 marlas of the garden land
from Mahant Sundar Das, and allowed the Akalis access to it. On
27 April 1923, Punjab Government issued orders for the release of
the prisoners. Thus ended the morcha of Guru ka Bagh in which,.
according to Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee records, 5,605
Sikhs went to jail.
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