Sant Kartar Singh Bhindranwale

Sant Giani Kartar Singh Khalsa Bhindranwale led the Damdami Taksal from 1969 to 1977, after Sant Gurbachan Singh Khalsa and before Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale. The Taksal's own history says he was born in 1932 to Mata Labh Kaur and Jathedar Chanda Singh of the village of Purane Poore, which it places in Amritsar district, studied at Khalsa College, Amritsar, and took amrit in 1948 at Bhindra from Sant Gurbachan Singh's jatha. He married in 1950, worked for a while as a village revenue official and in 1957 resigned to live permanently with the Jatha.

Key moments

• June 1969: Sant Gurbachan Singh Khalsa died and Kartar Singh became head of the Taksal. He set up its headquarters at Gurdwara Gurdarshan Parkash at Mehta Chowk, 25 km north-east of Amritsar (The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism).
• 7 October 1976: the Taksal's account says he gave saropas at Bir Baba Budha Sahib to 36 dhadi jathas and many preachers who had taken amrit, before a crowd it puts at 250,000.
• 1975: for the 300th year of Guru Tegh Bahadur's Shaheedi he led processions during the Emergency (37, by the Taksal's count). On 7 December 1975, at the Ram Lila ground in Delhi, the Taksal says he alone stayed seated when Prime Minister Indira Gandhi came onto the stage where Sri Guru Granth Sahib was present, and said in his speech that she should bow to the Guru rather than have Sikhs rise for her.
• He spoke against the Nirankaris. The Encyclopaedia says opposition to them had begun in his time, before the 1978 clash at Amritsar under his successor.
• 3 August 1977: his car crashed near Hussainpur, near Ludhiana. He died on 16 August 1977 and was cremated at Mehta on 21 August. Before his death he had named Jarnail Singh as his successor, who was formally elected at the bhog on 25 August 1977.

Remembered for: a preacher's life of amrit parchar. The Taksal records that his sons were Bhai Amrik Singh, later a Shaheed, and Bhai Manjeet Singh. Much of the detail about his preaching comes from the Taksal's own history, which is a devotional account.