Amar Sacrificial Veer Banda Vairagi
Lakshman Dev alias Banda Vairagi was born in a simple Hindu family to Shri Ramdev in Poonch, Jammu and Kashmir on October 27, 1670. He was proficient in Malla war and wrestling since childhood. His favorite sport was to play hunting in his youth. One day while hunting, he unknowingly shot an arrow at a pregnant deer. Due to this, an infant came out of his stomach and died in agony there. Seeing this, his heart became sad and he left home and went on a pilgrimage. He learned yoga practice from many sadhus and then started living by making a hut in Nanded.
One day the tenth Guru Govind Singh of the Sikhs came to his hut. All his four sons were sacrificed. Two were martyred and two were elected in the walls by the Mughals. He asked them to leave their dispassion in this difficult time and fight against Islamic terror and atrocities prevailing in the country. Hearing the story of the Guru's sacrifice and the sacrifice of his sons, his arms fluttered. He accepted Guruji's offer and became a warrior of the Sikh sect formed to free India from the tyranny of Muslims. Guruji named him Banda Bahadur and gave an order to take revenge on the Nawab of Sirhind, who got both the younger sons alive in the wall.
It took almost four months for Banda Bahadur to reach Punjab. Banda Singh reached Narnaul, Hisar and Panipat from Maharashtra via Rajasthan and sent a letter asking for cooperation from all the Sikhs of Punjab. It was propagated among all the Sikhs that Guru ji had sent the Banda as their Jathedar. Under the leadership of Banda, the brave Rajputs taught the farmers of Punjab, especially the Jats, to use weapons. Soon the army was formed.
Banda Bahadur took thousands of Sikh soldiers along and set out to destroy the Mughals. He first beheaded the executioner Jalaluddin, who cut the head of Shri Guru Tegh Bahadur ji. Then killed Wazir Khan, the Nawab of Sirhind, who got both the younger sons of Guru ji to be buried in the wall alive. Due to this his name got fame all around.
He launched a vigorous attack on the Mughal power and the Muslim landlords of Punjab and Haryana. First of all, the Mughal treasury near Kaithal was looted and distributed among the army. After that the Muslim landlords of Samana, Kunjupura, Sadhaura were thrown into the dust.
The Mughal power was shaken by the victory of Banda Bahadur. The Mughals began to feel that another Shivaji was born. If they are not stopped then Maratha and Sikh together will overthrow Muslim rule from India. So the Mughals again adopted the same old policy of divisiveness and rumors were spread that Banda Singh himself wanted to become a guru and that he was not following the teachings of the Sikh sect. For this, he also made the second wife of Guru Gobind Singh Ji, Mata Sundari, who was living in Delhi under the detention of the Mughals, as a seal. Mata Sundari asked Banda Singh to stop the bloodshed, which Banda Singh refused.
The result was that most of the Sikh army left him, however, Punjabi Hindus stood by him, which gave him courage. Then he gave military training to other Hindu castes and Brahmins besides Jats, Gurjar Kshatriyas and tried to strengthen his army.
In the beginning of 1715 AD, the huge royal army of Farrukhsiyar under the leadership of Abdul Samad Khan laid siege to Gurudas Nangal village near Dhariwal area for several months but did not succeed. Then, under the influence of Mother Sundari, who became the seal of the Mughals, Baba Vinod Singh opposed Banda Bahadur and left the fort with hundreds of his supporters. Vinod Singh and 500 of his supporters were given a safe way to leave due to the agreement and conspiracy with the Mughals.
Here the situation was getting worse due to lack of food items. Eventually, seeing the condition of starving women and children, he surrendered on 7 December on the condition that Mughal civilian men and innocent women would not kill children, but this did not happen. The Mughals mercilessly killed more than 40 thousand innocent men, women and children living in the fort of Gurdas Nangal.
The governor of Punjab, Abdul Samand Khan, sent Baba Banda Bahadur to Delhi under the supervision of 21 thousand armed soldiers. The banda was locked in a cage and the chains around his neck and arms and legs were held by the Mughal generals carrying drawn swords around this cage. In this procession, the severed heads of thousands of Sikhs were kept on 100 bullock carts and the heads of thousands of other Sikhs were carried by the Muslim army at the tip of their spear. Banda Bahadur's 780 soldiers were involved in this procession as prisoners.
Mughal historian Mirza Mohammad Harsi has written in his book Ibartnama that every Friday after prayers, 100 prisoners were brought in batches outside the Kotwali of Delhi to the ground of the slaughterhouse, where the hoarding library is today. The Qazi would ask them to choose between Islam or death and then brutally slaughter them with swords. This cycle continued for one and a half months. To witness the killings of his associates, the banda was brought to the slaughterhouse by being locked in a cage so that he could see this painful scene with his own eyes.
One of the courtiers, Muhammad Amin asked, "Why did you do such bad things that are causing you this plight?"
The banda proudly replied, "I was a weapon in the hands of the Supreme Lord to punish the victims of the subjects. Have you not heard that when the number of the wicked in the world increases, he sends a servant like me to the earth?"
When the banda was asked what kind of death he wanted to die, the man replied that I am no longer afraid of death because this body is the root of sorrow. Hearing this, there was silence everywhere.
The Mughals used many tricks to get them to accept Islam. When all the efforts failed, every one of his generals was killed in front of his eyes. To break the morale of Banda Bahadur, the Qazi ordered him to kill him with a knife by putting his four-year-old innocent son Ajay Singh in his lap. When the banda was not ready for this, the Mughals dissected that innocent in front of them and took out the beating heart of that innocent and forcibly put it in the mouth of the man.
The next day the executioner took out both his eyes with the sword. When the slaves did not budge, their skins began to peel off every day with hot tongs. Then his hands and feet were cut off. In the end, he was killed by cutting off his head. Banda Bahadur neither pleaded nor cried out. In the face of every persecution and oppression of the Mughals, he sacrificed for the defense of the nation and religion.
Hundreds of salutes to this great warrior who sacrificed his everything for the protection of such Mahavira, Nation, Dharma!