Deep Singh Shaheed: The Man in the Legend

Based on many years of research spent examining a wide range of Persian,
Punjabi and English sources alongside genealogical records, oral traditions and
a thorough battlefield study, this work tends to eschew hagiography to ground
all research on this spiritual-cum-military leader whose life story interweaves
through the turbulence of 18th-century Punjab, often referred to as the
‘heroic century’.
The author successfully brings alive the life and times of Deep Singh as
the quintessential sant-sipahi (warrior-saint), the unofficial patron-saint of
Courage and Resolve, and a rare embodiment of the Khalsa ideology as he
seeks to faithfully answer several questions. Why has the Deep Singh narrative
acquired such epic proportions to grip generation after generation? Often
portrayed in prints with his head in one hand and a broadsword in the other, is
he more myth than reality?
In the process of collation, analysis, and synthesis, the dialectic filtering of
information through the prism of logic and probability has been an essential
adjunct for the author, especially while trying to boldly separate myth from
certitude for several contentious issues, including Deep Singh’s last battle
fought in November 1757 near Amritsar.
This account promises to be the more memorable for its stylistic panache and
equally for the generous representation of vaars in the original Gurmukhi
script alongside their English transcreation in rousing rhyme.