Tohra Passed away

[mrgreycells]

http://www.tribuneindia.com/2004/20040401/main8.htm

Tohra was to turn 80 on September 24 this year. His wife Joginder Kaur is a simple woman who stays back in family home in the village. Known for his honesty, Tohra still owns an ordinary house in the village and small chunk of land that he got as a share from his ancestral property.

[Guest mehtab]

from the same page

SGPC chief Tohra passes away

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, March 31

Veteran Akali leader and SGPC chief Gurcharan Singh Tohra died at Escorts Hospital, New Delhi, tonight.

Mr Ranbir Singh, personal assistant to the SGPC chief, said doctors at the hospital declared Mr Tohra dead at 12.41 a.m.

According to Mr Harmail Singh, son-in-law of Mr Tohra, his body will be flown to his native village Tohra for cremation.

Ailing SGPC chief Tohra was airlifted to New Delhi in an air ambulance on the direct intervention of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

Perturbed over the continuous deteriorating condition of Mr Tohra, Mr Parkash Singh Badal, former Punjab Chief Minister who visited Escorts Hospital here, spoke to Mr Vajpayee on the telephone and urged him to arrange air ambulance to transfer Mr Tohra to New Delhi.

It is learnt that Ms Sushma Swaraj, Union Health Minister, personally spoke to Dr Naresh Trehan, Executive Director and Chief Cardiac Surgeon, Escort Hospital, and asked him to send an air ambulance immediately. Dr T.S. Kaler, Senior Cardiology Consultant, reached here in an air ambulance and then decided to shift him to New Delhi after examining his condition. Before shifting Mr Tohra, Dr Kaler consulted his family members and told them about the risk of shifting. However, the family members of Mr Tohra insisted that Mr Tohra be shifted immediately.

OBITUARY

He dedicated his life to Sikhism

Sarbjit Dhaliwal

Tribune News Servic

e

Chandigarh, March 27

SGPC chief, Gucharan Singh Tohra, who became the first Parliamentarian to be elected to the Rajya Sabha for the sixth time last week, enrolled himself as a member of the Akali Dal in 1938 and had never looked back since then. Besides, he had been a member of the Lok Sabha (1977-79) and had been in Parliament since 1969 with a minor gap.

Born in an ordinary Jat-Sikh farmer family of Tohra village in Patiala district on September 24, 1924, Tohra’s first major political action was his participation in the Akali Morcha that led to his arrest in 1944.

He became the secretary of the State Akali Dal in 1948 and its junior vice- president in 1959 after holding important positions in the party at the district level.

His “unbeaten” innings in the SGPC started in 1960 when he was elected as a member. Since then he had remained a member of this body, also called Parliament of Sikhs. In 1961, he was elected to the executive of the SGPC. An outstanding speaker on religious and political issues, Tohra was elected President of the SGPC for the first time on January 6,1973, after the demise of Sant Chanan Singh and continued to hold the office till March 23, 1986. Again he returned to this body as its chief on November 11, 1986, and held this position till November 28, 1990. He stayed out of office for about one year after this.

He staged a comeback as President of the SGPC on November 13, 1991, and stayed in the office till March 15, 1999. He resigned from the presidentship of the SGPC on March 15, 1999, after a prolonged political clash with the President of the SAD and the then Chief Minister, Mr Parkash Singh Badal, who had called all SGPC members belonging to his camp at Amritsar to remove him from the office by passing a no-confidence motion against him on March 16, 1999.

After a meeting of the executive of the SGPC at Jind in Haryana where pro-Badal members of executive had a spat with the followers of Tohra, he wrote a passionate letter to all member

s of the SGPC before sending his resignation to offices of newspapers. Those who replaced Mr Tohra as SGPC chief for brief periods since 1973 till date have been Mr Kabul Singh, Mr Baldev Singh Sibia, Bibi Jagir Kaur and Mr Kirpal Singh Badungar.

Split with Mr Badal denied Tohra the opportunity to be a part of the high- profile historic tercentenary celebration of birth of Khalsa at Anandpur Sahib. Tohra and his associates held a separate function at Anandpur Sahib.

Following a patch up with Mr Badal last year, Tohra, who had not been keeping well because of persisting heart problem, became the SGPC chief on July 27 last year replacing Mr Kirpal Singh Badungar, a close associate of Mr Badal. He has held the office of the SGPC President for a record period of over 25 years, only with a few short breaks.

Along with his religious journey as SGPC chief, Mr Tohra was elected first time to Rajya Sabha in March 1969 to retain the seat only for one year but next time he was elected for a full term of six years till April 2, 1976. Again he was elected to Rajya Sabha in May, 1980 and then yet again on April 3, 1982, to April 2,1988. His present term as the Rajya Sabha member started on April 10, 1998 but he had been elected sixth time on March 19 last for another term that was to start on April 9. He had also a short stint of two years as elected Member of the Lok Sabha from 1977 to 1979 when Janata Party came to power immediately after the emergency. He had remained in jail for several years from time to time because of his participation in political and religious agitations.

Interestingly, he was never elected to the Punjab Assembly. Head of several other religious, educational and other bodies, Tohra was to turn 80 on September 24 this year. His wife Joginder Kaur is a simple woman who stays back in family home in the village. Known for his honesty, Tohra still owns an ordinary house in the village and small chunk of land that he got as a share from his ancestral property. He did graduatio

n in Punjabi literature from Panjab University, Lahore. He had been preparing to celebrate the 500 birth anniversary of Guru Angad Dev in April and 400th year of Parkash Utsav of Guru Granth Sahib.

[SaadhRayn Kaur]

waheguru

[Jassika]

ya..ppl been asking me

Tohra??

SGPC??

:@

oh well atleast everyone hears about him now...

[Singh47]

It’s an end of an era. Although many people say bad things about him, I don’t think he deserves all that. He was not bad like Badal. Tohra was not a rich man unlike badal. I believe that whatever Tohra did, he did because he believed it was in the best interest of the Sikh Panth. Badal on the other hand does whatever he does to get rich and to set his son as the next Akali leader.

Tohra in my opinion was alright, not a bad Sikh. He will be missed. But I cannot say the same about Badal when he passes away.

[birkhalsa]

Spring in the autumn of the patriarch

SGPC chief Gurcharan Singh Tohra, 80, passes away

http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.ph...ontent_id=44182

CHANDIGARH, MARCH 31: When the end came past midnight Wednesday at the Escorts Heart Institute and Research Centre in Delhi, there couldn’t have been a greater tribute to Gurcharan Singh Tohra than the lakhs at the Golden Temple, cleaning the holy sarovar to realise his dream.

When he first became chief of the Sikh Gurdwara Prabhandak Committee (SGPC) in 1973, one of his first acts was to inititate kar sewa for the sarovar. Three decades later, he started the work again: this time to instal a filtration plant. On Day One, as lakhs showed up, 80-year-old Tohra suffered a heart attack which finally led to his death tonight, hours after he was flown in from Amritsar.

Tohra is folklore in Punjab. In the early 1960s, as a young man, he campaigned on a bicycle for elections to the Gurdwara committee. Shortly after he was handed the party ticket, they gave him a rickety jeep and Rs 2,000 for campaign expenses. After he won the elections, Tohra walked up to Akali Dal chief Master Tara Singh and handed over Rs 1,300. He said he couldn’t spend the money.

Although he never became Akali Dal chief or a minister, Tohra’s imprint has always been all over Sikh politics. To many, his puritanical streak was the face of a hardliner. His constant dabbling in politics and a certain religious aura was an oddity in Sikh affairs.

To the devout, th

ere very few clean politicians like him. In six decades of public life, his landholding remained the same. Perhaps the only property change he made was add an RCC roof to his old, kuccha house. And when it came to adopting children, he preferred to adopt a girl—in a state with the worst sex ratio in the country. Later, he spurned well-heeled suitors to marry her to an ordinary clerk at a simple ceremony.

At the crack of dawn, Tohra would start meeting people in his village home. By six he would have set out on a little tour— moving from one gurdwara to another, visiting a school, college or meeting people. Unlike others who would love to spend a day in Chandigarh, he would return to his village —every night. Barring the Akali agitation days, this was his daily routine.

For years, he did not have a telephone at his home: ‘‘Sardarni tung haugee (the phone will trouble my wife).’’

The one luxury that he allowed himself was a car to make his daily travel comfortable. But a car was never bought. It would be offered by one of his associates and duly returned.

To his credit, Tohra gradually re-built the institution of the Akal Takht. He often said: ‘‘Sikhs have the Akal Takht, the supreme religio-political entity which no other community has.’’ But he was accused of misusing the institution, of appointing Jathedars who would later summon the likes of Badal to the Akal Takht.

He had his failings. His writ failed to run when Bhindranwale took over the Golden Temple complex. By his own admission, he had failed to stem the rise of self-styled babas and sants in Sikhism. But now that he is gone, he will surely be missed. Even outside Sikhdom.

[S1ngh]

LOT better than badal clan..

[mann_kaum_layee_qurbaan]

badal is next....

[Mkhalsa]

hopefully he will die of natural cuases soon.. or perhaps someone has to help nature along? hehe

[Guest mehtab]

they called him "pope" of the Sikhs here : http://headlines.sify.com/3019news2.html?h...hs,~passes~away

:@ :wub: :wub: