30 August, 2013

The Bhat Brahmins

Kashmiri Pandits and their contributions to Sikhism

The fact that the Sikh Gurus always surrounded themselves with Kashmiri Pandits has been suppressed as well as distorted by the so called 'historians' funded by the British to manipulate Sikh history. Instead, a deep contempt and hatred of Brahmins was encouraged in Punjab through various interpolations and canards spread by the British Christian missionaries. One of the main culprits is the Irish Christian missionary known as Max Arthur Macauliffe, who was funded by the British East India Company to further weaken Hindu society by establishing the Tat Khalsa Singh Sabha, the SGPC, AKJ, Nirankaris ( modern day Sikhs ) etc These prophets of doom nurtured a narrow minded puritanical Victorian ideals established by the British Raj, began to label Guru ordained Sanatan Sikhi as being false. They were financed heavily to set up their own printing presses and conversion schools, to carry out distortions of Punjab history by going as far as spreading canards that Jatt Sikhs were not of Indian or Hindu origin but were from Syria, Jordan and Greece or were Sythians - the agenda to give the notion that the Sikhs constitute one Race and Nation,and are not a part of Mother India at all. By specifically picking and choosing what should be a part of the Sikh holy scriptures, by erasing or manipulating the Banis such as the Kartarpur Banis, which are in Braj Bhasha, these stooges of the British re-wrote the Shri Adi Granth ji, renamed it the Guru Granth sahib and made it the main scripture to be followed by all Sikhs. The Tat Khalsa began to radically alter Sanatan Sikhism as it had been preached by all the Gurus, so to ensure it conformed to their new British Raj accommodating perception.
Facts ignored and distorted by Tat Khalsa & SGPC

Contempt of Brahmins was the main goal of the Jaichand stooges such as Kahn Singh of Nabha and Teja Singh Bhasuria. Myths were created about how the 9th Guru Tegh Bahadurji sacrificed his own life for some Kashmiri Brahmins who had allegedly run to him for protection. The accounts of the numbers of Kashmiri Pandits seeking protection from Guruji have been mentioned as : 500,600, 1000, 16, 25 etc with inconsistencies in the story from one sikh writer to another. But having done painstaking research on the various circumstances surrounding the beheading of Guru Tegh Bahadurji, one cannot stop taking into account the fact that guruji was initially summoned by Aurangzeb to accompany Raja Ram Singh ( commander of Mughal army ) to invade Assam in 1667. The war had continued for at least 3-4 years after which both Guruji and Ram Singh returned to Delhi defeated by the Ahom Hindu Kings. Accompanying Guru Tegh Bahadurji for the Assam mission were two other Kashmiri Pandits - Bhai Mati dass and Dayal Dass, who were brothers, but this has been conveniently ignored by the Tat Khalsa stooges. In 1675, Guru Tegh Bahadurji and the two Kashmiri Pandits were summoned by Aurangzeb and were mercilessly tortured to death. The sacrifice of the Kashmiri Pandits has been written as 'brave Sikh sacrifices' in Tat Khalsa chronicles, blatantly leaving out the facts. 






Eleven Bhats who contributed Swayyas to Shri Adi Granth were all Brahmans. There are 123 compositions in holy book. The Bhat Brahmins all originally from Kashmir, were Saraswat Brahmins, who wrote the Bhat Vahi Talauda Parganah Jind, which has the genealogy of the Gurus, in a script called Bhatakshri. These Bhats were Bhat Kalsahar, Bhat Jalap, Bhat Kirat, Bhat Bhlkha, Bhat Salya, Bhat Bhalya, Bhat Nalya, Bhat Gayana, Bhat Mathura, Bhat Harshas, and Bhat Bhalya. Of these, Bhikha Bhat was of Sultanpur Lodhi whose family had escaped the tyrannical Islamic reign in Kashmir and given initiation as a shishya by Guru Amardas at Gobindwal. He lived upto the time of Guru Arjan Dev to whom he introduced seventeen other Brahmin scholars - Santokh Singh (Sri Gur Pratap Suraj Granth), Bhai Vir (Guru Granth Kosh) and some others among the traditional scholars count 17, and Pandit Kartar Dakha puts the figure at 19.This variation in numbers is owed to the fact that the Bhats used to sing the Gurubanis in chorus of traditional Ragas taken from the Sama Veda.

The works of these intellectual Brahmins are known as Bhat Banis. According to Bhai Santokh Singh, Sri Gur Pratap Suraj Granth, `They were the Ved`as incarnate" (p. 2121).