Siva Singh, a Punjabi Sikh, discovered how deeply racism was entrenched in Australia in 1915, when he appeared in court at Benalla in north-east Victoria.

The small, dark-skinned man with a distinctive pink turban had voted in the previous three federal elections, but under the White Australia policy he was struck off the electoral roll.

He was determined to fight the injustice.

The local newspaper reported an "aboriginal native of Asia" was "very angry and kicked up ructions", especially after his case was dismissed and he was ordered to pay court costs.

Though Indian-born, Mr Singh was officially classed as a "natural-born British subject". Like Australia, India was part of the Commonwealth and sent troops to fight for the empire in the Great War.

Mr Singh was both proud and patriotic, and wanted equal rights in his adopted country.

Horse-drawn hawkers' wagons were once a common site in rural Australia. ( Supplied: John Henwood )

He had arrived in Australia in 1897, along with thousands of his countrymen. They were considered guest labourers and forbidden to bring wives or family.

Mr Singh became a hawker or travelling merchant, selling household goods from a small horse-drawn wagon.

He lived frugally, slept in his wagon, and though he sent much of his money home, he prospered.

By 1915 he owned a large grazing property near Benalla.

After a decade-long legal battle, he regained the right to vote in 1925.

Relics of a bygone era

A monument to Siva Singh was unveiled last November. ( ABC Landline: Tim Lee )

While his story was barely known until recently, Mr Singh is now celebrated as a civil rights campaigner and trailblazing lay priest.

He imported a holy book, the Sri Guru Granth Sahib, that enabled him to perform religious ceremonies for his countrymen.

In 1920, Sikhs from across southern Australian came to his farm for the first Australian reading of the Akhand Path, a day-long prayer ceremony in a "rough bush shrine … consisting of four posts decorated with gum boughs".

A cloth canopy covered the holy book and the Union Jack and Australian flag were hoisted either side.

"What they set up is basically the first temple in Australia," Crystal Jordan, an artist and researcher at the Australian-Indian Historical Society, said.

After discovering Mr Singh's story, Ms Jordan and fellow historian Len Kenna approached Benalla Council to erect a monument in Mr Singh's honour. It was unveiled in November.

They learned Mr Singh's hawker's wagon from the 1900s was in a local farm shed.

It was taken to Melbourne, where 82-year-old Mr Kenna has spent more than year painstakingly preserving it.

"It was too valuable an object, an historical and religious relic, not to report or preserve," he said.

Mr Kenna and Ms Jordan found secret compartments containing snippets of Mr Singh's life: empty cans of curry, children's shoes and rates notices.

They hope to put the wagon and items on permanent display in Benalla later this year.

An array of objects were found in Siva Singh's wagon. ( ABC Landline: Tim Lee )

An inspiration to the Sikh community

Mr Singh died in 1954.

Benalla local John Hanlon, 82, is one of the few people left who remember him.

"He was a very gentle person and was very highly regarded in the area," Mr Hanlon said.

He has vivid childhood memories of a special drawer in the wagon.

Dr Santokh Singh believes Siva Singh's story remains relevant today. ( ABC Landline: Tim Lee )

"It was the children's drawer; he'd open it up and there'd be all sorts of little trinkets in it, mainly made out of glass and bits and pieces," he said.

"We were always there with expectation as to what Siva Singh might pull out and give us out of this drawer."

Travelling hawkers played a vital role for remote settlers far from towns and shops.

"It was a like a mobile shop; it was the corner shop coming to a farm," said Mr Kenna, who remembers hawkers visiting his childhood home in Western Victoria.

"[It was] everything you would use in a house or home, like spices, pots and pans and material, scissors, sewing, haberdashery, things like that," Ms Jordan said.

Sikh community leader Dr Santokh Singh said Mr Singh's story was enormously important and relevant today.

"[Siva Singh] appealed to the High Court of Australia and he was reinstated," Dr Singh said.

"That's why he is very important to us.

"I think it highlights the multiculturalism in Australia, that we lived together, all the communities, different cultures, different religions in a great harmony.

"We wish and we pray that it should last forever."

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