Gurdwara Sis Ganj Sahib

Gurdwara Sis Ganj Sahib stands in Chandni Chowk, Old Delhi, on the spot where Guru Tegh Bahadur was beheaded in public on 11 November 1675 on the orders of Emperor Aurangzeb. Sis means head. The Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) has its offices here. Gurdwara Rakab Ganj, where the Guru's body was cremated, is a separate shrine near Parliament House.

Key moments

• 25 May 1675: Kashmiri pandits appealed to the Guru at Anandpur. The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism says he told them the earth would be redeemed only if a worthy person gave his head, and his son Gobind Das, then about nine, said none was worthier than his father.
• 12 July to 4 November 1675: arrested near Ropar, held for over three months, then brought to Delhi in an iron cage. He was ordered to accept Islam and refused.
• 11 November 1675: Bhai Mati Das was sawn in two and Bhai Sati Das was burned in cotton wool that day. The Guru was beheaded. Bhai Jaita secretly carried the head to Anandpur. Bhai Lakkhi Shah took the body to his house in Raisina and burned the house to cremate it, which is why Rakab Ganj stands apart.
• 1783: Sardar Baghel Singh, whose Sikhs entered the Red Fort on 11 March and won the emperor's leave to build gurdwaras on the Gurus' sites, raised a shrine here after removing a mosque that stood on the spot.
• After 1857: the gurdwara was later demolished and a mosque built in its place. Raja Sarup Singh of Jind pressed the British to have the mosque removed, local Muslims opposed it in court, and mosques and gurdwaras alternated on the site during the long litigation.
• 1930: the present building was raised after the verdict of the Privy Council.
• 1971: the DSGMC bought half the adjoining Kotwali for Rs 1,625,000. The government offered the other half in 1983, which led to a large renovation.
• November 2025: for the 350th martyrdom anniversary, The Tribune reported thousands of devotees at the shrine on the eve, with a nagar kirtan from Sis Ganj to Rakab Ganj set for the next day and a three-day samagam at the Red Fort. A DSGMC spokesman said the Red Fort was chosen because the execution order came from there.

What it holds. The old domed building houses the sanctum. The basement marks the execution spot, and the tree trunk under which the Guru was beheaded is kept behind glass. The DSGMC publishes the Punjabi monthly Sis Ganj from here.

What it means to the Panth. Guru Tegh Bahadur is remembered as Hind di Chadar, the shield of India, a title The Tribune used in October 2025. This is the place where that sacrifice is remembered, in the capital of the empire that ordered it.