Putting together a jigsaw

SURINDER Singh has the intense look of a man with a mission. Tall, though not overbearing, this six-foot-tall Sikh with a Pathan background sits in his study in Chandigarh, amidst hundreds of books, all neatly arranged and catalogued. This speaks of a tidy mind, which bodes well for someone who is researching "fragments" of history based on Sikh coinage.

How did this 74-year-old man who retired from the Indian Defence Accounts Service in 1987 get to writing history? He had collected many Sikh coins during his tenure in Punjab but when he tried to learn more about them, he found that there was discordance in what he saw and what he read. In fact, most of the "facts" about the coins were the repetition of previous historians' observations, which Surinder was not satisfied with.

He started researching about Sikh coins and wrote research papers, but when he discussed the matter with historians, "No one said he did not know about the coins, but there was no help." He was hurt when he presented his papers to a senior professor, who discouraged him from pursuing it further. "I am grateful to him because the hurt made me work more and I redoubled my efforts."

It was at a seminar in Patiala, where he was given five minutes to present a paper he had worked on for four months, that the tide changed. Surinder just got up, introduced himself and sat down, since "what I have to say would take more than five minutes." Some in the audience protested and after the seminar, many people came to him. "That's when I felt that there is a place for me under the sun."

What he found lacking in established historians he got from his family — support and encouragement. He is grateful to his wife Opinder Kaur and children, who "allowed me to pursue my passion."

"My younger son, Chander Mohan Singh, was interested in the coins, but unfortunately, he passed away. This book is dedicated to him." Surinder Singh registered for his Ph.D when he was 69. He was awarded a Ph.D by Rabindra Bhaarti University, Calcutta in 2001, and he still reminisces proudly about the viva conducted by Prof Basudev Chattopadhyay, the well-known historian of Calcutta University.

What next? Surinder is working on "Concept of Sikh Sovereignty," as a Senior Fellow of Indian Council of Historical Research. Surinder Singh is also a great admirer of Banda Bahadur, "who set a standard of obedience and devotion to the Gurus." He wants to set up a memorial at the Lohgarh Fort, near Gopal Mochan, in Himachal Pradesh and write a biography of Banda Bahadur.

A man of many talents, Surinder is a sculptor, with three of his works in the permanent collection of the Government Museum and Art Gallery, Chandigarh. Along with Sikh coins, and a sculpture fashioned out of polyurethane, an interesting new work that adorns his study is a steel torso made of shrapnel collected from Army firing ranges. — R. S.

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