SHAHEED
Shaheed is a word of Arabic language. It means evidence.
But. With the passage of time it came to be used in the sense: “one, who is evidence (of sacrifice for faith)”. In other words: one who is quoted as example of sacrifice for faith. Shaheed is a person who laid one‟s life for the preservation of one‟s faith or for Dharma (Righteousness). Similarly, those who are killed during the struggle for preservation of their identity and entity are also called Shaheed.
The Sikh nation is one of those nations who have been most persecuted, throughout the world history, probably equal to the Jews. The difference between the both is subtle. The Jews had been tortured and killed. The Sikhs had been offered to choose between „faith and life‟ and all the Sikh men, women and children chose faith.
Three of the Ten Guru Sahib (Guru Arjan, Guru Tegh Bahadur and Guru Gobind Singh) became martyrs. Since 1606 (till 2020), hundreds of thousands of the Sikhs have died for their faith. The most heinous and unspeakable atrocities and savage killings of the Sikhs were hitherto (and even now) unknown to the history of the world.
According to a rough estimate, from 1606 to 1995, two hundred thousand Sikhs had lead their lives for the cause of faith. It does not include the hundreds of thousands of the Sikhs killed in 1947 during the partition of the Punjab.
The atrocities committed on the Sikhs by Farukhsiyar, Mir Muin-ul-Mullik (Mir Mannu), Lakhpat Rai, Zakaria Khan, Ahmed Shah Durrani, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Beant Sinh, K.P.Gill etc. have pushed the most fascist rulers of the world into shame and shade.
(Dr Harjinder Singh Dilgeer)