Amritsar: New York-based Sikhs in America (SIA) will install a 9-foot-high khanda (Sikh religious symbol) at the original site of Saragarhi memorial built by British in 1897, where 21 Sikhs soldiers had laid down their lives while fighting the Pashtun Orakzai tribesmen during the famous battle of Saragarhi.

While talking to TOI upon his return from Saragarhi in Kyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPA) province of Pakistan on Thursday, SIA chairman Gurinderpal Singh Josan said that he had installed a Nishan Sahib and offered prayers at the site where 21 Sikh solders were attacked by a large number of tribesmen.

Josan had led a delegation of SIA to visit Saragarh memorials built at the original site by British in 1897, and another one again built by British in 1901. British army had cremated the mortal remains of 21 soldiers on September 14, 1897, and erected a memorial there on September 25, 1897.

“Being a tribal area not many people could visit the memorial since there was always a risk of attacks by Afghan tribes so British erected another Saragarhi memorial near Lockhart Fort in 1901,” said Josan, adding that the original memorial was destroyed in an earthquake in 1971.

He said that hardly anyone visits the Saragarhi memorial barring some Pakistan army officials or schoolchildren from nearby villages.

Claiming to have received permission from the Pakistan government to install a khanda, Josan said, “We will soon install it. Besides, we are also developing a park around the memorial.” The work was being inspected by vice-president of Saragarhi Foundation Sunny Singh, who hails from Hangu village.

Earlier, SIA had employed descendants of Orakzai tribe fighters who had fought against 21 valiant Sikhs during the battle of Saragarhi to renovate the memorial built in 1901.

SIA had also brought five stones from the original site of Saragarhi memorial . “We will give one stone each to the war museum, Khalsa College and Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee,” said he adding that one stone each would be given to the panchayat of village Dhunn in Tarn Taran district, which was the native village of Naik Lal Singh, one among the 21 soldiers. One stone will be given to Sarwali Welfare and Charitable society.

Society president Harpreet Singh Bhatti said he was constructing the World War I Memorial on Batala-Dera Baba Nanak road which would be on way to Kartarpur corridor. Bhatti’s grandfather was martyred in WW I.

SIA has also taken up the issue with the Pakistan government for opening of Saragarhi memorial for the tourists and the Sikh Jathas visiting the country on pilgrimage. “We have taken up the issue directly and through various like minded bodies in Pakistan, and we are hopeful that Pakistan government will consider our demand sympathetically,” he said.

