Did Banda Singh Bahadur depart from the Khalsa? The Tat Khalsa and Bandai split

The claim: The Tat Khalsa tradition holds that Banda Singh Bahadur strayed from the Khalsa after his victories. The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism entry "Tatt Khalsa" (Sudarshan Singh) lists the charges: he replaced the salutation with "Fateh Darshan", took red garments instead of blue, and let followers treat him as Guru. Wikipedia adds vegetarianism and, on Hari Ram Gupta's account (1978), says Mata Sundari excommunicated him for refusing to submit to Emperor Farrukh-siyar. Ganda Singh notes that the Mahma Prakash has Banda say at his death, "The order of the Sat-Guru was contravened by me".

The sourced facts:

• The commission. Ganda Singh (Life of Banda Singh Bahadur) quotes C. H. Payne that Guru Gobind Singh named Banda "not as Guru, but as Commander of the forces of the Khalsa". The only parting injunction he finds in the earliest records is to live in chastity; Bhangu and Gian Singh later added more.
• His own words. His hukamnama of about 26 December 1710 to the Khalsa of Jaunpur says "This is the order of Sri Sacha Sahib. The Guru shall save the entire Khalsa of Jaunpur", and forbids meat, fish, onion and intoxicants. Ganda Singh reads "Sacha Sahib" as the Guru, not Banda, and quotes the Risala-i-Sahib-Numa: Banda called himself the Guru's slave, "but [some of his followers from amongst the] Khalsa took him to be the Guru". He accepts that Fateh Darshan was real and came in practice to replace "Wahiguru ji ka Khalsa", and that Banda married against the Guru's injunction, though with no moral or social sin.
• The first parting. The Encyclopaedia (Binod Singh) says Banda's followers split into Tat Khalsa and Bandai Sikhs in October 1714, with Binod Singh torn between obeying Mata Sundari and fighting Banda. Ganda Singh has Binod Singh ride out of Gurdas Nangal after a council-of-war quarrel, doubts the Mahma Prakash's explanation (a wish to marry again), and says no schism arose in Banda's lifetime and no captive deserted him.
• Mata Sundari. Ganda Singh found no hint in Mughal records or Sikh histories of Farrukh-siyar negotiating with her or of any conflict with Banda, and traces the story to Bhangu. He and the Encyclopaedia record that after Banda's death she sent Mani Singh and six Sikhs to run the Darbar Sahib, its income to go to the langar.
• 1721. The Bandais are said to have claimed half that income. At Baisakhi 1721 both camps mustered and Mani Singh proposed that slips reading "Wahiguru ji ki Fateh" and "Fateh Darshan" be put in the sarovar; the "Wahiguru ji ki Fateh" slip rose first. A wrestling bout before the Akal Takht, won by Miri Singh for the Tat Khalsa, followed. The Encyclopaedia says the Bandais were expelled in 1721; Ganda Singh says some were readmitted, and that "Tat Khalsa" first appears in Gian Singh.
• Since. The Bandais kept to Dera Baba Banda Singh at Bhabbar, Reasi, where Ganda Singh in 1935 found the Guru Granth Sahib installed and Banda and three descendants named in ardas after the Sahibzadas. The Encyclopaedia says a few survive, most take Khalsa initiation, and they count Banda an eleventh Guru.

The Panthic answer: Ganda Singh writes that Banda took amrit, kept his hair, never used tobacco or halal meat, and held to his mission; beyond Fateh Darshan and the marriage he finds nothing to warrant the charges, and of the Bandai claim of succession he says "There can be no successor to Guru Govind Singh, as Guru". The Sikh Rehat Maryada (authorised by the Akal Takht) defines a Sikh by belief in the Ten Gurus "from Guru Nanak Dev to Guru Gobind Singh" and the Guru Granth Sahib. On 25 June 2021, at an SGPC Gurmat Samagam, officiating Akal Takht Jathedar Giani Harpreet Singh called Banda "the General who established the Sikh state and became the first king" (The Tribune). The institutions thus honour him as general and Shaheed and allow him no Guruship. Accounts still differ: the Tatt Khalsa entry says he took red garments, while Ganda Singh mentions red only in the turban and scarlet robe his captors put on him in mockery; Wikipedia reports that Purnima Dhavan finds his hukamnama phrases equivocal.