Treasure trove of the past: Sikh Research Centre at Khalsa College, Amritsar

The Sikh Research Centre established at the Khalsa College has now been opened for public. Serving as a museum and seat of excellence in Sikh history research, the centre has probably the largest collection of exhibits on Sikh history and heritage. Tribune correspondent Neha Saini and lensman Vishal Kumar give a sneak peek into the treasures collected from the glorious past.

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The Sikh Research Centre, set up inside the heritage Khalsa College premises, is one of the most exclusive centres for research in Sikh heritage, cultural and socio-political history of the undivided Punjab.

Originally set up in 1930, the Sikh research centre was established as a seat of excellence by Dr Ganda Singh, a noted Sikh historian, who headed this department from 1930 to 1947. The five galleries created inside the centre houses thousands of artefacts, books, manuscripts, paintings on Sikh religion, Sikh philosophy, culture, politics and the history of Punjab by establishing a reference library and a gallery of thousands of manuscripts, rare books, portraits and paintings of great historical significance and value. Some of these have been brought here from the museum in Britain and Lahore. Several notable works including Gurbani Viakaran, a textual grammar of the Guru Granth Sahib, and 10 volumes of commentary of Guru Granth Sahib entitled Shri Guru Granth Sahib Darpan form part of the exhibits.

The museum houses rare and exclusive collections depicting various periods in the Sikh history. It has a collection of 375 paintings, 601 manuscripts, newspapers from 1904, 675 files books and journals. As many as 261 manuscripts are in Persian and Urdu language and 207 rare manuscripts are in Punjabi. The manuscripts include ‘Pothi Mehrban’, Janam Sakhi of Guru Nanak Dev by Mehrban (1651) copied in 1928. Out of approximately 6,397 books, more than 500 are a century old. There are 500 paintings, photographs and weapons of the 17th and 18th centuries. The museum has recently added to its collection rare coins, dating back to the 3rd century, some belonging to the Naga dynasty and Satvahana dynasty. Ragamala painting, Sikh rules and old doors of the Golden Temple, works of noted master artist Bhai Gian Singh Naqquash, who spent a lifetime working on the frescoes at the Golden Temple, have also been preserved.

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