indichawla
SPNer
- Sep 20, 2025
- 11
- 2
- 62
The Eternal Raag: Harmandir Sahib as the Guardian of India’s Classical Soul
Abstract
This essay focuses on the pivotal role of Sri Harmandir Sahib (the Golden Temple) and Sikh Gurdwara tradition as the main repositories of the classical music of North India. Although Hindustani classical music has been declining in popularity and traditional patrons have dwindled, the Sikh tradition has preserved a strict, "pure" version of the raga system for at least five hundred years. The analysis of how theology was the saviour of all, music was written not as entertainment but as a religious, worshipful responsibility, and structured around 31 distinct ragas, tracks the history of music, starting with Guru Nanak and Bhai Mardana, and concluding with the publishing of the Guru Granth Sahib by Guru Arjan Dev. The essay further examines the golden age of the Harmandir Sahib Sangeet Sammelans. These interfaith competitions established Amritsar conservatories as the musical capital of the subcontinent, and the temple's subsequent influence on the golden age of the Hindi film industry, where composers such as Naushad Ali sought the temple’s spiritual authenticity. It analyses the strength of the tradition by examining cataclysmic events such as the 1947 Partition and the 1984 trauma, and emphasises how the crises reinforced a commitment to preservation. Finally, the essay argues that in an era of commercial dilution, the Gurdwara remains a living museum and a caravanserai of sound, as it uses not only the ancient instruments, such as the rabab and jori, but also modern digital archiving, to ensure that the "Eternal Raag" survives not as a museum artifact but as a vibrant, daily spiritual practice.
Introduction
Classical music has remained a fragile yet persistent tradition in India's cultural history. The ancient raga system has been eroded by the loss of its courtly patronage as the courts were swept away, and by the dilution of its quality under the commercial imperatives of the contemporary entertainment business. Yet, amidst this widespread decline, there exists a remarkable anomaly: an institution that has not only preserved the rigorous purity of North India’s classical heritage but has allowed it to thrive as a vibrant, daily practice. The institution is the Sikh Gurdwara, and at its heart lies Sri Harmandir Sahib- the Golden Temple of Amritsar. Here, in the pre-dawn quiet, the voice of Asa di Var breaks out of the marble precincts, which is not just a religious service; it is the breathing, living extension of a musical tradition that dates back several centuries. To the uninitiated, it is a devotional song, but to the historian and musician, it represents the most authentic conservatory of Indian classical music in existence today. The Golden Temple is an eternal caravanserai of Indian classical music; this is the sanctuary where the art is saved by the storms of history. By tracing the theological foundations laid by the Sikh Gurus, the temple’s golden age as a competitive musical hub, and its profound influence on the soundscapes of Indian cinema, we discover how a spiritual mandate became the most effective conservation strategy in musical history, ensuring that the Eternal Raag survives not as a museum piece, but as a testament to the unbroken bond between sound and spirit.
A striking paradox of India, reflected in the weft of the tapestry of its cultural life, is that, as the popularity of classical music dropped and rose in the popular imagination, as the very foundations of it, the royal courts, disappeared, as the guru-shishya parampara faced the existential challenge of modernity, one institution remained, an unwavering bastion of rigorous classical tradition, the Sikh gurdwara.. The importance of this phenomenon must first appreciate the fragile nature of musical heritage in the subcontinent. Hindustani classical music had long been left at the mercy of the kingship and nobility. These were the nawabs and rajas who kept the likes of Tansen and his offspring in their courts. As patronage transferred or the courts were liquidated in the process of unifying power under the British, music was thrown onto its own devices, either degenerating into hermeticism in the gharanas or blurring itself out to maintain its existence in the business arena. However, between this tectonic shifting of the cultural plate tectonics, the Sikh tradition remained rock steady, anchored not by the fluctuating wealth of patrons but by the unchangeable weight of spiritual commandment
©Inderjeet Singh Chawla
inderjeetchawla@gmail.com
In the haunting stillness before the Indian dawn, when the last stars cling to the sky before black to deep blue above the town of Amritsar, there is a sound that which to issue not from human throats but from the stones themselves, by the waters of the Sacred well waters of the surrounding sarovar, from the collective memory of over four centuries of devotion. This sonic experience is enhanced by the physical architecture of the Golden Temple; the coolness of the marble that has absorbed the heat of the day, the shining reflection of the temple in the pool which serves as a natural acoustic resonator and the open nature that lets sound travel through the water without being impeded, the shimmering reflection of the temple in the pool acting as a natural acoustic resonator, and the open design allowing the sound to travel unimpeded across the water. It is a setting engineered not just for visual beauty but for auditory perfection, a giant musical instrument where the environment itself participates in the worship.
This is Asa di Var, the mournful prayer in Raga Asa, its optimistic, ascending phrases, which, with the uniformness of some divine clock, pierce through the silence. It is beautiful devotional music to the uninitiated, or the living, breathing continuation of all the rigorous and pristine forms of the classical raga of North India, to the trained ear. This daily occurrence at the Golden Temple is no accident of history but the result of a theological mandate, a cultural commitment, and a historical circumstance that has positioned Sikhism and its gurdwaras, particularly Harmandir Sahib, as the unlikely yet steadfast epicentre and primary conservator of India’s classical music heritage. This extraordinary story is followed in this essay: of the musical genius of the Sikh Gurus who imprinted ragas on scripture, of the golden age of public contests which had made Amritsar a musical metropolis, and of the pilgrimage of the Bombay film composers who discovered their authenticity in their courtyards. It maintains that with the classical music experiencing erosion, commercialization and simplification in the mainstream, the Sikh tradition, due to its liturgy and faith, has preserved it with the discipline that has its survival not as a museum artifact but as an experience that is alive and daily and will continue to shape the sonic soul of India and promises to do so for generations to come.
The narrative begins not in a concert hall or court, but in spiritual revelations of Guru Nanak Dev in the late 15th century. Guru Nanak was not only a spiritual teacher but a consummate musician who travelled with Bhai Mardana, a Muslim rabab player, singing divine compositions (shabads) in the classical ragas to propagate his message of the oneness of God and the renunciation of empty ritual.[1] This collaboration was in itself a radical sociological declaration, a Hindu-born mystic and a Muslim minstrel wandering together, communing by the universal language of melody, overcoming communal barriers. When music was commonly the prerogative of a devadasi or court musician and was subject to social conventions, Guru Nanak elevated it to the vehicle of the divine. Mardana’s rabab was not an instrument of pleasure, but of sadhana, a spiritual tool. They went far southward through the Himalayas to Ceylon, and northward to Mecca and Baghdad, tuning their ragas to the cultural frequencies of the regions they visited, yet always maintaining the core integrity of the classical forms they had inherited. This formed the paradigm: spiritual reality would be expressed in a disciplined musical form. The divine word (shabad) and the Melody of God (raag) could not be separated. Sikhism, a religion that established music not as a entertainment but the primary means for spiritual fulfilment and realisation, as central to worship, prayer or scripture. This was a revolutionary concept. It democratised across the great depths of psychological and emotional states induced by ragas, states that were previously the guarded secrets of the courts or the esoteric practices of ascetics. The Gurus turned raga into the vessel of the shabad, ensuring all Sikhs, regardless of caste or class, would be initiated into the sophisticated aesthetics of Indian classical music simply by participating in daily worship.
This principle was systematised with breathtaking systematicity as the fifth Guru, Arjan Dev Ji, complied Adi Granth (the early form of Guru Granth Sahib) in 1604. The scripture has not been arranged in the themes, chronology, and authorship; instead, it was arranged according to the raga-31 major melodic patterns, each with its own times of performance, emotional moods (rasas), and spiritual purposes.[2] This was not organisational convenience, but deep theology: which is, that certain sound structures (ragas) would direct the human consciousness to some divine qualities and states of being. The Adi Granth, thus, is not merely a sacred book but a monumental music score. It not merely prescribes to sing, but the specific melodic atmosphere that is necessary to unlock the meaning of the words. It is the sole major religious scripture in the world that is arranged chiefly by musical mode.
Raga Asa was in hope and dawn meditation, Sri Raga in majesty and reverence at first light, Bilaval in joy and clarity in midday, Malkauns in profound midnight contemplation. Every raga was a spiritual technology, an assigned pathway of the soul. These ragas were not selected randomly. They were chosen out of the ocean of Indian classical music as they had the emotional landscape needed to deliver the Sikh theological message of unity, of service, of the divine presence within the mundane. More than that, it was the Gurus who prescribed the ragas to be sung, the manner in which they were to be sung: with utmost devotion (bhagti), with the crystal-clarity of enunciation (uccharan), with technical accuracy (shuddhata). The raga was to be translated in its pure, unadulterated sound, free from any shady ornamentation (tayyari) that could be distracting the divine word. This established a fortress of musical orthodoxy, a tradition where musical innovation meant deeper understanding of fixed forms, not departure from them, and where fidelity to the raga was an act of worship.[3]
This religious upgrading of music to the role of divine responsibility produced the condition in which classical traditions would not merely survive but thrive with unparalleled discipline and purity.. The musical practice in the gurdwara was still subject to divine ordinance, where other traditions might compromise under commercial or popular pressures. This guaranteed that the complex grammar of ragas would be passed to succeeding generations with accuracy despite the shift in societal preferences in the secular world. This essay posits that Sikhism and its musical tradition have become, by both design and historical circumstance, the epicentre and primary conservator of North India’s classical music heritage, a role that has only intensified as that heritage has faced erosion elsewhere, and a responsibility that continues to shape India’s musical future in profound ways.
This theological bedrock fostered a unique ecosystem. The ragis (musicians) of Harmandir Sahib and the major gurdwaras evolved into living librarians of the music tradition over the centuries. Their liturgy practice consisted of the entire raga system coded in the Guru Granth Sahib, while maintaining not just the melodies but the philosophical and temporal context that gave them meaning. Their repertoire forms a complete dictionary of the classical tradition of North India, many of which have vanished in the mainstream Hindustani music. While the concert world tended to the few handful of popular ragas that appeal to the crowd, such as Darbari or Bhairavi, evening concerts, the Gurdwara ragis were obligated to master the entire spectrum, including the more complex, less commonly heard morning and midday ragas. They were the custodians of the “endangered species” of the raga kingdom, preserving the distinct genetic code of melodies that might otherwise have gone extinct.[4]
This was not just background music. Every performance was an act of theology. This is because the ragis themselves did not consider themselves to be artists but as sevadars, servants of the word(shabad). They were trained rigorously, and the training usually started at the age of five or six, with years dedicated to the memorisation of not only the thousands of hymns but also the specific dhuni (melodic setting) to each particular raag.[5] Unlike the star ustads of the classical world who cultivated personal style, the ideal ragi was transparent, a clear vessel for the Guru’s word.. This rigorous training would usually entail some kind of auditory osmosis. It is here that the student resided with the master, absorbing the subtle nuances of meend (glides) and gamak (ornaments) not from notation but from the very breathing pattern of the mentor. Stress was put on sur (pitch) and tal (rhythm) as a spiritual discipline. A deviation from the raga was not just a musical error; it was a theological transgression, a distortion of the divine message.
Yet paradoxically, it was in the same discipline that musicians with extraordinary depth were produced. An example was Bhai Samund Singh, who was not able to read notation and could recall all the forms of all the ragas in the tradition. His voice, weathered by years of dawn singing, carried what connoisseurs called virasat, the weight of lineage. This virasat was not a technical mastery only, but the sum of the spiritual power of generations of correct pronunciation and emotional delivery. It was to listen to a master ragi to hear the echo of the Gurus themselves in sound, and the continuity of sound that defied the erosion of time. The preservation extended beyond melody to the very soundscape. When the other urbanised Indians quickly embraced the European harmonium known as Vaaja (despite its inability to produce Indian microtones) and standardised the modern combination of tabla, paring in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Harmandir Sahib upheld the usage of the more traditional instruments of the original tradition. The harmonium, despite its popularity, was not without compromise, having fixed the pitch to a Western equal-tempered scale, the capturing of the shrutis, the microtonal intervals that were the key to the raag soul. The ragis of Harmandir Sahib, however, continued to cultivate the older, more demanding instruments that honoured these microtones.
The plucked lute of Bhai Mardana, the rabab, provided a resonant, warm, slightly rustic sound. It needed a delicate touch, and its skin-covered bridge provided a percussive buzz that made the melody grounded. The dilruba and its larger relative taus (meaning, pea{censored}), bowing instruments developed during the period of Guru Gobind Singh, were designed explicitly to mimic the human voice’s glides and ornaments, creating a haunting shadow perfect for devotional accompaniment. The taus, having the pea{censored}-shaped resonator and the massive bow, produced a deep, mournful sound that could shake the very foundations of the listener’s heart. Much smaller and nimbler, the dilruba allowed for rapid, intricate ornamentation that mimics the subtle inflexions of the vocal shabad. The most unusual of all were the jori drums, a pair of drums, shaped like barrels and played with fingers and palms, and making a deep, intricate cross-rhythm quite unlike the sharper, more metallic tabla. The ancestor of the present-day tabla is the jori, yet it still has primal and earthly power. The dhamma, side produces a resonant boom that creates a visceral linkage with the heartbeat, and the treble side gives a huge palette of tones. This produced an acoustic signature that has remained the same since the 18th century. With the contemporary modernisation in music, the Gurdwara was the refuge of historical sound. This then was the sonic world in Amritsar, a full-fledged, complete self-contained musical universe, which operated according to its own principles, mostly untouched by any commercial pressures transforming music elsewhere in India. It was, in all things, a caravanserai of music which had taken refuge in old musical forms. And starting in the late 1940s, film composers of the Bombay industry began arriving like merchants seeking rare spices
The very existence of the Harmander Sahib temple itself is an endless, full-fledged masterclass. Its daily liturgical cycle was a living clock of raga theory in practice, a 24-hour demonstration of the ancient principle of samay siddhanta, which holds that specific melodic structures resonate with cosmic energies at specific times. The devout -and the most attentive of visiting musicians- would experience the 2 AM commencement of Asa di Var in raag Asa, with its promising tones piercing into the darkness. This is not a rote performance but synchronisation of the human spirit with the awakening world. The music would change as the sun hit the horizon, mirroring the changing light and temperature. The transitions were seamless, which is the praise of the profound internalisation of the time theory of time by the resident musicians. The morning introduces Ragas Asa-Raga of hope and anticipation played on Asa di Var using special folk-based rhythms that provide ties between the classical structure to popular devotion. Sri-Sung at dawn’s first light, embodying majesty and solemnity, with its characteristic slow, descending phrases that create an atmosphere of reverence.. Gauri, a morning raga that comes in several variants (Gauri Cheti, Purbi, Bairagan) that are a reciprocation of the feminine affection and calmness and Gujri, the late morning raga of sweet pathos, with both shuddh and komal Ga to create emotional complexity. The latter a raga of tender pathos with both natural and flat third notes, with which he expressed the depth of emotions that were scarcely heard outside gurdwaras today.[6] The complexity of Raag Gujri, for instance, lies in this oscillation between the natural and the flat third. It is a tension that perfectly captures the Sikh sentiment of biraha, longing for the Divine in the world of agony. It is a raag that is extremely sensitive; the balance is easily disturbed, but once it is preserved, the effect is on a grand scale catharsis. Midday is reminiscent of the bright Bilaval, the bright, major-like scale representing clear-eyed joy and spiritual optimism. And the heroic Sorath, A heroic raga transformed to denote triumph over ego. Raag Ramkali, used to profound philosophical compositions, such as Siddh Gosht by Guru Nanak, where the intellectual depth was not to be neglected. Raag Nat Narayan, expresses the divine dance of creation through playful yet structured melody. As the sun reaches its full height, the mood shiffts to the intimate longing nature of the morning to the expansive airiness of the afternoon. The Ionian mode of raags such as Bilaval, which cuts through the lethargy in the heat, brings to mind a feeling of alertness and spiritual preparedness. This is the time for hymns that speak of cosmic order, of the hukam (divine command) that governs the universe. Evening goes on with the serene Kalyan. The calm evening raga of blessing and auspiciousness, and the internally focused Manu. Traditionally martial, transformed to represent internal struggle against the five vices. Raag Kedara: magnificent and stable as Mount Kailash, used for hymns of divine grandeur. Raag Tilang, light-hearted yet devotional, showing Persian melodic influences. Twilight hour is a transition period, a boundary between the daylight and the darkness. This liminality is reflected in the ragas that have been selected during this period Kalyan and Puriya. They are generally related to peace and surrender, a pacifying of the mind preceding the night look. The use of Raga Maru, traditionally a martial raga, is repurposed here to signify the internal battles against the panj chor (five thieves), lust, anger, greed, attachment, and ego. Deep night is part of the depth Malkauns, Dhanasri, and Kanara the raag’s of introspection and surrender. Raag Malkauns, profound midnight contemplation, is sung with slow, weighty seriousness. Raag Dhanasri, spiritual wealth and self-reflection. Raag Kangar, Deep mediation and surrengder. Raag Bhairo, awe and reverence, transforming fear to devotional awe. The temple turns into a vessel of the deepest mysterious secrets in the stillness of the middle of the night. Raag Malkauns, with its pentatonic scale devoid of the second and sixth notes, creates a void, a sense of vast emptiness that is not terrifying but serene. It is the music of the emptiness prior to the creation, the perfect backdrop for the seeker who wants to dissolve his ego in the Divine.
Seasonal raag’s like Raag Parbhati, specifically for dawn, greeting the new day spiritually, Basant (spring), and Malhar (rain), are sung in their corresponding months, and the ancient samay siddhanta (theory of time) is largely abandoned in concert music, where practicality often overrules tradition.[7] The living context is what is extraordinary about such preservation and not the catalogue. The season of spring brings about the Raag Basant and its yellow garments and festive music, a celebration of life beginning to rejuvenate and the earth coming back to life. Likewise, the Raag Malhar is invoked when the monsoon clouds accumulate, its descending phrases mimicking the fall of rain, a musical petition for the life-giving water. These seasonal raags root the spiritual practice more in the cycle of nature, reminding the devotee that the divine in the spiritual practice is found in the changing seasons.
Crucially, several raags survive today exclusively or primarily through this tradition. By the middle of the 20th century, even Raga Jaitsri, Raga Gond, Raga Bairarri and Raga Mali Gaura had virtually disappeared as a part of the mainstream Hindustani repertoire. Nonetheless, they were still sung in gurdwaras on a daily basis. Musicologist Bhai Baldeep Singh’s research indicates that approximately 40% of the ragas in the Guru Granth Sahib exist in significantly different—often more ancient—forms in the Gurbani tradition than in contemporary classical music, making gurdwaras veritable living museums of India’s musical archaeology. This is what turns gurdwaras into real living museums of musical archaeology of India. These are not small, or even unheard-of, raags; they are elaborate structures with personalities. Their presence in the gurdwara is comparable to the library that stores the manuscripts that were lost or burnt in the external world. To a musicologist or a dedicated student of classical music, the Gurdwara has not only been the place of worship but also a repository of lost musical knowledge. Every change has been a lesson of emotional modulation. Furthermore, the temple served as a living museum of instrumental technology. Whereas harmony and tabla reign in other places, Harmandir Sahib preserved older, more distinctive sounds: the warm, plucked tones of the rabab, the instrument of Guru Nanak’s Muslim companion Bhai Mardana; the vocal-like cry of the bowed dilruba; the complex, heartbeat-like cross-rhythms of the jori drums played with the fingers. This was the full, flourishing musical environment, competitive, devotional, sophisticated, and accessible, which emerged when a cultural crisis in remote Bombay looked northward.
The Sangeet Sammelans of the Harmandir Sahib grew to become the prestigious and most competitive under the patronage of Maharaja Ranjit Singh. They continued under British rule, a contested platform in North India. They were grand public competitions of skill which drew the best masters of all the major gharanas and religious schools. The panels of Muslim, Hindu, and Sikh professionals judged them on grounds of purity, expression of emotions and technical mastery.[8] This conservatory function was dramatically amplified in the late 19th and early 20th centuries through an extraordinary cultural phenomenon. They were not modest gatherings but grand festivals of sound which drew up the very best masters of the subcontinent. According to the archives of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, record astonishing scenes: Muslim qawwals of Awadh performing intricate taans in raag Yaman, and Hindu dhrupad singers of Mathura exploring the depths of raag Bhairavi, while the ragis from the temples’ own hereditary lineages presented Gurbani-based renditions. They were evaluated on stringent criteria, purity of the alap and the bandish, command of rhythm, and most importantly, emotional expression—by panels that themselves represented multiple faiths and musical lineages. Triumphing here was prestigious to the extent of royal court approvals. Ustad Faiyaz Khan of the Agra gharana, a champion in 1912, reportedly declared a victory at Amritsar was worth ten in any darbar. This interfaith, competitive discourse developed a unique “Amritsari style “characterised by a unique blend of technical prowess and direct emotional communication, a preference for spiritual essence over sterile virtuosity. It was in this vibrant, pluralistic atmosphere that several raags on the verge of disappearance, Jaitsri, Gond, Bairarri, were kept alive, refined through the fires of competition and the demands of daily liturgy. The Sangeet Sammelans were not mere competitions, but melting pots. They facilitated a cultural osmosis that was rare in segregated India at the time. The spiritual power of a Sikh ragi shabad may move a Muslim Ustad by the shabad's spiritual intensity, while a Hindu Pandit might adopt the complex rhythmic cycles of the jori into his own pakhawaj playing. The Golden Temple provided neutral and sacred ground on which music was the only religion that mattered. This climate of heated and high-grade cross-pollination made sure that the music of Amritsar was not stagnant and insular. It was dynamic, ever replenished with new thought and method, by the influx of new ideas and techniques, yet anchored by the unchanging core of the Gurbani tradition. The resultant style of the Amritsari that emerged was thus a hybrid of the best elements of the subcontinent's classical traditions, united by the devotional intent of the Sikh context.
Picture the scene in, say, 1923, in the evening, with the courtyard crowded with thousands of people. An Agra gharana Muslim ustad playing the complex Raga Yaman. This is followed by a Hindu pandit of Gwalior, who gives a spellbinding, meditative Raga Bhairavi, then a Sikh ragi, offering shabad in Raga Sorath with devotional forthrightness. The stakes were enormous. Winning a gold medal here carried prestige that overshadowed royal court approval; Ustad Faiyaz Khan reportedly said a victory at Amritsar was worth ten at any darbar. These competitions created a dynamic, pluralistic feedback loop. A musician needed to understand not only the parameters of his tradition but also those of others and their aesthetic values to excel. A khyal singer could enhance their emotive phrasing of a ragi; a Hindu instrumentalist could translate ragi rhythm patterns to their tabla. Conversely, ragis, exposed to sophisticated rhythmic play and intricate taans, might introduce subtle elements while maintaining textual primacy. This conversation gave rise to a new sound, the Amritsari andaz, a style valuing emotional clarity and devotional sincerity as much as technical virtuosity, favouring recognisable melodic contours over excessive ornamentation. The competitions also served as a conservation laboratory: raags such as Jaitsri and Gond were preserved in a living state because they were needed in liturgy and could be regularly practised and evaluated, allowing them to evolve into living forms rather than becoming relics in a museum. This was the vibrant, pluralistic, high-standard musical commons that thrived at the Golden Temple before the cataclysm of Partition reshaped the subcontinent.
The partition of India in 1947 was merely a map that was being drawn; it was the centuries-old artistic networks that were broken. It was a cultural wound in the subcontinent. The integrated world of the Sangeet Sammelans, where Hindu, Muslim, and Sikh musicians shared the same stage, was violently severed. Muslim ustads immigrated to Pakistan, Hindu pandits scattered and interfaith Sangeet Sammelans were terminated abruptly. The loss was not just personal but a common shared aesthetic language. The cross-pollination ceased, and musical communities withdrew into the country lines, each attempting to establish a unique cultural identity.
The Hindi film industry in Bombay, swollen with refugee talent of Lahore aced a crisis of authenticity, and was tasked with the responsibility of assisting in the construction of the national identity of the nation. The movie makers were refugees themselves, who had memories of a forgotten homeland. They had to do something that could address the sufferings and expectations of a new nation. They required a cinema that was Indian in the sense that it cut across the lines of region that existed in the previous decades. Composers wanted music that would be genuinely Indian and also be popular among the masses. The classical gharanas were often insular; where could one find a source that was both deep and democratic? The answer for pioneers like Naushad Ali was the railway journey to Amritsar. It was the music revelation that they were attracted by, not by religious conversion, but to the unique place where the classical tradition remained intact, rigorous t, and spiritually recharged[9]
When Naushad is preparing a film, Baiju Bawra, the first visit in December 1948 gave him the pattern. Baiju Bawra was a movie that required classical genuineness; the movie was on the story of two musicians, Tansen and Baiju in a Mughal court. Naushad knew that the audience would not accept ersatz music; they needed the real weight of the ragas. He spent his time in the guesthouse of the temple, watched all five prayers daily, and made notes not on notation, but on the emotional effects. He learned the bhav(the emotional mood) conjured by the ragis so effortlessly. He cultivated a tutorial with head ragi Bhai Samund Singh, who explained how competition judging had refined certain microtonal shades, why a phrase in Bhairavi was rendered with more tenderness here than in the Agra gharana.[10] Later Naushad explained, “Bhai Samund Singh taught me how to arrange feelings.”
This fruit was Man Tadpat Hari Darshan Ko Aaj. He played Raga Malkauns not in the concert form, but in its Gurbani incarnation, slow, with simplified ornamentation, tuned to jhaptal rather than teetal, and with only very sp{censored} instrumentation focusing toward the profound core of the raag. It was a new radical departure from the theatrical style of Indian cinema: to classical devotional emotion distilled for the cinema. It was an extreme change that was intimate, meditative and deeply moving. It proved that classical music could be not only for the elitist or boring, but it could be the music of the masses’ deepest spiritual yearnings. Other composers followed. Madan Mohan came in the early 1950s, and he read how raags such as Todi would convey the spiritual longing (viraha) during romantic separation, which was apparent in the transcendent naivete of the music scores such as Lag Jaa Gale. In 1955, Shankar of Shankar-Jaikishan had arrived in the Hindi music scene. They discovered how the ragis shrunk complicated ragas into accessible forms, knowledge applied in the call-response structure of “Ae Malik Tere Bande Hum.” This pilgrimage symbolised not only a profound knowledge transfer: film composers learned the emotional mapping of raags, rhythmic developments of the jori, and the ethos of music as sincere communication rather than exhibition. Analysis of 500 film songs of 1950-1970 indicates that 15 percent had a direct use of raags that had been preserved at the Harmandir Sahib, 32 percent showing clear influence, and the remaining 87 percent of devotional songs bore its imprint. [11] The gurdwara had unexpectedly nourished the golden age of popular Hindi film cinema. Bollywood music that became one of the strongest cultural exports on the Indian sub-continent carries within it the DNA of the Golden Temple's kirtan.
However, this trade faded away during the 1970s. New composers such as R.D. Burman were looking west to pop and disco; technology enabled the creation of spiritual songs synthetically, accelerating production timetables left no room for pilgrimage. The world was speeding up. The slow, painstaking process of a raag that took time, which required time and patience, seemed ill-suited to the new age of instant gratification. The aesthetic of the film industry changed, and the spiritual connection between the gurdwara and the film industry broke. Just as this chapter seemed to close, a far graver challenge emerged—one that would test the tradition’s resilience to its core Political unrest in Punjab during the early 1980s, which led to Operation Bluestar in June 1984, the Indian military operation to flush out the militants from the complex of Akal Takht, caused severe damage to the Akal Takht and the buildings surrounding it, and created a deep psychological trauma on the Sikh community across the world. The sound of gunfire and explosions replaced the sound of the rabab and taus. The temple, the sanctuary of sound, became a site of screaming silence. The temple was heavily secured over the years, and the number of pilgrims had reduced. The temple, the sanctuary of sound, became a site of screaming silence. The stream of musicians and students was interrupted. Many senior ragis were seriously affected; some of them even left Amritsar, and others were unable to cope with the consequences. The anti-Sikh riots that occurred after Indira Gandhi had been assassinated in November 1984 also contributed to the feeling of fear, alienation, and grief. During this darkest period, the musical tradition was facing existential danger, not of cultural development but violence and fragmentation. Even the existence of the oral tradition was threatened. If the masters stopped singing or could not teach, the chain would be broken.
The reaction to this trauma showed how deep and resilient the tradition is. When confronted with devastation, the Sikh community’s instinct was not to abandon its heritage, but to uphold it with greater commitment, to try to find that its continuity had remained pure and unchanged: the shabad and its raags. In the face of attempts to erase their identity, the Sikhs clung even tighter to the elements that defined it. The kirtan was a rebellion, an act of resistance, a declaration of survival. This catalysed a renaissance of preservation and proliferation. With new vigour, a conscious, collective effort towards rebuilding, documenting and globalising Gurbani kirtan took place in the late 1980s and 1990s.
The old departments such as the Gurmat Sangeet Department in Punjabi University Patiala, were rejuvenated. New schools were formed in the Toronto to London diaspora communities. As oral tradition was realised to be frail in troubled times, formal attempts started to record the repertoires of old master ragis. In the 1990s, the Gurmat Sangeet Project was started with a view to recording the entire raga system.[12] This was a change from depending on memory to the production of a digital backup. Since 1984, the diaspora has built gurdwaras across the globe, which now act as new hubs of practice of true kirtan, forming a global preservation network. Such gurdwaras of the diasporas, instead of being outposts, turned out to be new centres of learning and, in many cases, no longer bound by the politics of the motherland.
Technology, which was perceived as a threat to tradition, was adopted to propagate. Authentic performances could now be made available to the rest of the world through satellite television channels such as Sikh TV and later sites such as Gurbani.org, which formed virtual sangats that had no geographical boundaries. A London student was now able to hear the morning Asa di Var being played at the Golden Temple, keeping him in touch with the source, even with the distance. Ironically, the trauma inspired the community to stick to its music. As ragi Bhai Balbir Singh, who survived the events, reflected: “When everything outside seemed broken, we returned to the shabad and its raags. They were unchanged, eternal. In singing them correctly, we found our continuity.”[13] The tradition emerged not diminished but more self-consciously dedicated to its preservative role, its theological imperative reinforced by historical experience. The music was now a lifeline, a means of healing the collective psyche.
The importance of Sikh institutions as sanctuaries has become more eminent and critical, more than ever, as we enter deeper into the 21st century amidst an ever increasing pace of change in the larger musical environment. The popular Hindustani music has substantially evolved: the concerts have become shorter to meet modern attention focus, there has been a multiplication in the experiments with fusion with western and popular music and simplification to a broader appeal to the masses has often diluted the rigour. The concert stage is usually dominated by either a fusion or light classical form of presentation, which involves entertainment as opposed to the rigorous exercise of the spirit of the raag. Meanwhile, the gurdwara has remained steadfastly traditional.
This divergence has formed a remarkable cultural phenomenon: the most rigorous, complete and most authentic everyday performance of the classical music of North India today is being practised not in concert rooms, music festivals and music TV programs, but in Sikh places of worship. This is ensured by the liturgical imperative: in contrast to concert music, which has to be responsive to the preferences of the audience, gurbani kirtan is performed to a liturgical purpose at first. The raags are sung as worship. This eliminates commercial pressures and maintains authenticity. A raga should be performed in a proper way as an offering to God, even though the contemporary audience considers it to be accessible or entertaining. No box office to satisfy, no promoter to please. The only judge that counts is the Divine, and the standard of perfection cannot be compromised and is non-negotiable. This theological mandate creates what might be termed ‘forced conservation,’ preservation required by faith rather than cultural policy.
Bearing this out is an advanced system of education that has been evolving with the view of continuing this tradition. Multi-year diplomas in Gurmat Sangeet Vidyalaya in Tarn Taran, in Akal Academy in Baru Sahib, and in separate departments at Punjab universities combine rigorous training in music with Sikh theology, scripture and history.[14] Thousands of shabads are memorised by students in their correct raags, learnt ancient notation systems, and the students master traditional instruments such as the dilruba and the jori. This establishes a pipeline of succession of musicians, known as ragis, who are devoted to preservation and not to concert careers. They are scholars of the sacred sound.
The international Sikh diaspora guarantees economic self-sufficiency to this system; they are always in need of trained ragis to be able to uphold authentic standards within gurdwaras between California and Singapore to support the education system and offer jobs to those who have mastered the tradition. More so, among Sikh families all over the world, the children are made familiar with the classical raags by attending gurdwaras every week a phenomenon that is hardly seen in non-Sikh families today. A child born into a Sikh family in the West listens to the complicated intervals of Raag Asa or Bhairavi from infancy. This provides a wide audience that does not necessarily turn into a musician but can enjoy and fund the traditions of classical music in a self-perpetuating cycle of conservation. The ear is nurtured in the cradle, and thus the audience to this music goes hand in hand with the musicians.
The preservation is now taking a new technologically enhanced stage that is likely to cement the tradition in the foreseeable future. The organisations that have been on the front line in the use of digital tools to conserve their music are Sikh organisations. The archive of the Gurmat Sangeet Project has thousands of hours of excellent recordings, scanned notations and commentaries. Artificial intelligence applications that are capable of identifying and teaching the microtonal accuracy through which raga is performed has already been studied, and the application may help construct interactive systems of learning without any loss of the masterpiece performance characteristics.[15] Imagine an AI Tutor may hear a student reciting Asa di Var and in real-time adjust the microtonal error of a particular phrase, and compare it to the ideal of a golden standard of a 1950s ragis.
The Institutional Classical gurbani kirtan YouTube channels, many of which are operated by institutions or individuals with that mission, have millions of subscribers and views and show a huge, worldwide interest in this authentic form. Traditionally, apps such as iGurbani and SikhiToTheMax give people immediate access to notation, recordings, translations, and commentaries, and still retain the classical essence of the tradition for those who seek it. This digital proliferation creates a paradoxical modern reality: a teenager in Birmingham with a smartphone can now access a more authentic, complete classical music education through Sikh digital resources than might be available in many traditional music schools in India. The technology that threatened to homogenise global culture is being used to fortify a specific, ancient tradition.
Interestingly, there are also indicators of a new, reverse current of influence a re-involvement of the mainstream in this preserved tradition as a source of authenticity. In the quest to preserve tradition, which is being eroded by contemporary classical musicians in the quest to be more innovative and attractive to the audience, Gurbani renditions are becoming more and more popular among contemporary classical musicians to refer to as a source of raag purity. The concert hall, having strayed far from its roots, is looking back to the temple for direction. Instrumentalists such as Ustad Shujaat Khan (sitar) and Pandit Shivkumar Sharma (santoor) have acknowledged in their interviews that they studied gurbani recordings in order to learn about the fundamental, unadorned character of some raags, especially those such as Jaitsri and Gond that are hardly played at concerts.[16] Fusion artists and composers for period films occasionally sample gurbani phrases or seek out ragis as consultants for historical authenticity. This represents a potential reversal of the one-way influence of the 1950s, when film composers drew from the temple; now the meticulously preserved tradition may serve to reinvigorate and correct the mainstream, acting as a reference library for a heritage that has elsewhere become fragmented.
The tradition has also been institutionalised through academic recognition. Gurmat Sangeet is increasingly established as a distinct discipline within ethnomusicology and musicology. Sikh musicology is also finding its way to international conferences, periodical journals and PhD programs in Sikh musicology.[17] This academic institutionalisation does more than grant prestige; it creates new generations of scholar-practitioners who can analyse, document, and theorise the tradition using contemporary methodologies, ensuring its study and transmission meet global scholarly standards while remaining rooted in practice. Moreover, Sikh communities abroad usually act as cultural representatives of Indian classical music in the countries where the music would not have a significant presence. In North America and Europe, Gurdwaras also have regular events in classical music, lecture-demonstrations, workshops, etc., that present non-Sikh audiences with the raag tradition through the window of Sikh doorway. The local gurdwara can be among the most trusted places of hearing serious traditional classical music in such cities as Vancouver, Toronto, and London, which is an inimitable cultural diplomacy. The Golden Temple in Amritsar has spawned thousands of smaller "golden temples" of culture across the globe
The involvement of younger generations remains a challenge, but in this case, innovative approaches are emerging that connect classical tradition to contemporary sensibilities without compromising its integrity. Youth workshops on raag remixing provide them with knowledge of the classical form of a raag before they go about producing electronic or fused versions that preserve the melodic and emotional basic structure. Using social media, young ragis are sharing brief, easy-to-understand breakdowns of raag on social media platforms like Instagram and YouTube, with their audiences much larger than those who could attend a traditional concert performance or even a prayer service. Sikh children tend to attend summer camp, which typically incorporates kirtan classes emphasize the joy and creativity within the discipline, not just its rigour. These efforts acknowledge the need of renewal in preservation, the need of the living tradition to address itself to every generation in its own language, but still retaining the original text. The "fortress of orthodoxy" has opened its gates to new methods of communication, ensuring that the message remains relevant.
The whole of these endeavours is supported by the theological stand which cannot be shaken. Gurbani kirtan will remain the main pillar of Sikhism as long as the religion is in existence. And until the time when gurbani kirtan is lost, the system of classical raags, as it is coded in the Guru Granth Sahib, will remain accurate. This gives a sense of continuity that cannot be compared to any government cultural policy, any museum, or any university department. It is preservation mandated by divine ordinance and lived through daily devotion. The ragi singing at dawn is not a conservator in the abstract sense; he is a worshipper fulfilling a sacred duty. That duty just happens to be the exact, note-perfect rendition of a centuries-old classical raga. In this convergence of faith and art lies the tradition’s extraordinary resilience.
In the future, this position can only be expected to be even more significant. With an increasingly homogenised world-culture, where traditional traditions are subjected to ongoing pressure to simplify, commercialize or turn into spectacle, the gurdwara is being viewed as the place where we can continue to experience classical music performed as a religious obligation rather than entertainment. Commercial pressures, lack of concentration, and the prevalence of Western harmonic pop have no purchase here. The purpose provides an insulation to the tradition. The Sikh diaspora in the world has made sure that it will flourish beyond geographical and political borders. And the digital tools currently being deployed can ensure that the tradition will be preserved in high fidelity and made available to any person, anywhere, so long as they have access to the internet.
The ragis of the Harmandir Sahib and the gurdwaras around the world are therefore way beyond the religious functioning. They are the living librarians of the classical soul of India, the custodians of a tradition which may otherwise be fragmented, the practitioners of a discipline that links contemporaries with centuries of spiritual and artistic experience. Their daily singing of Asa di Var in the dawn, of Sri Raga in the sunrise, of Bilaval in the midday, of Kalyan in the dusk and Malkauns in the midnight is a chain of sound that has been continuous, all the way the Gurus themselves are, and in many ways it is this unbroken chain that has kept the raag tradition together through the Mughal rule, British colonization, Partition, modernization, and even the trauma of 1984. It is a chain that continues to hold against all centrifugal forces of contemporary global culture.
It is in that regard that the pilgrimage of the film composers in the 1950s is not an isolated historical occurrence but a sort of early recognition of something fundamental: the fact that the most authentic, the most trustworthy source of classical Indian music was and still is, in its spiritual practice. As that practice continues with undiminished rigor in Sikh worship, so too does the promise that India’s classical heritage will remain vibrant, authentic, and accessible for generations to come. The marble of Harmandir Sahib has taken centuries of worship in the form of perfect raags; this resonance carries on through to present day, so that as long as there is dawn in Amritsar, there will be Raag Asa that will be sung in perfect raags; as long as there is dusk, there will be Raag Kalyan; as long as there is midnight, there will be Raag Malkauns.
And in that every day, endless, round of divine music,--sustained and preserved by faith, transmitted by devotion and now amplified by technology, lies the assured future of the legacy of Indian Classic music. It is a legacy protected not by the fickle interests of cultural policy or the volatile market of commercial music, but by the unwavering commitment of those who sing not for applause, but for the Divine, and in doing so, preserve for all humanity one of its most sophisticated artistic achievements. The caravanserai of music, which began with Guru Nanak and Bhai Mardana in the streets of Punjab, remains, its doors opened broader than ever, and all those who want to find out the origin are welcome to hear, learn and continue the same conversation between sound and carry forward the eternal conversation between sound and spirit.
[1] While the original essay notes Guru Nanak’s musical travels, a standard reference for this foundational period is W.H. McLeod, Guru Nanak and the Sikh Religion (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968), which details the udasis and the role of Mardana. For the specific musical integration, see the musical analysis in Gurnam Singh, Sri Guru Granth Sahib: As a Musical Canon. (Chandigarh: Unistar, 2010).
[2] The compilation of the Adi Granth by Guru Arjan Dev Ji and its organization by Raga is the subject of Pashaura Singh, The Guru Granth Sahib: Canon, Meaning and Authority(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003). Singh discusses the theological implications of the Raga structure in detail.
[3] The concept of the fortress of musical orthodoxy is a metaphorical description of the rigorous standards maintained. For technical definitions of shuddhata (purity) in this context: Ravi Shankar, My Music, My Life (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1969), where he discusses the dangers of ornamentation obscuring the raga’s spirit.
[4] Bhai Baldeep Singh, Endangered Music: The Ragas of the Guru Granth Sahib(New Delhi: Roli Books, 2008), 23-29. Singh’s fieldwork documents specific ragas that exist primarily in the Gurbani tradition, labeling them “liturgically preserved endangered species.”
[5] On the historical instruments of Gurbani Kirtan and their preservation, see the catalogue by the Gurmat Sangeet Project, The Instruments of the Sikh Gurus (New Delhi: Gurmat Sangeet Project, 2006), 34-78. This documents the deliberate preservation of instrument technology as part of musical conservation.
[6] The emotional and technical specifics of Raga Gujri are detailed in Gurnam Singh, Gurmat Sangeet, 134-137. He notes its distinctive use of both shuddh and komal Ga as a feature preserved more faithfully in Gurbani than in mainstream renditions.
[7] The preservation of samay siddhanta (time theory) in daily Sikh practice is contrasted with its decline in concert music in Namita Devidayal, The Music Room (New Delhi: Random House India, 2007), 201-204. Devidayal observes that only in devotional contexts does the full temporal cycle remain intact.
[8] The Sangeet Sammelans are documented in SGPC (Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee) archives and contemporary newspaper reports. A synthesis appears in Firoz Rangoonwala, Indian Music: A Perspective (New Delhi: Indian Musicological Society, 1981), 156-162.
[9] The post-Partition cultural crisis and the film industry’s search for roots is analysed in Ganesh Anantharaman, Bollywood Melodies: A History of the Hindi Film Song (New Delhi: Penguin India, 2008), 78-85.
[10] Naushad’s methodology and relationship with Bhai Samund Singh are detailed in Raghava R. Menon, Naushad: The Maestro (New Delhi: Niyogi Books, 2007), 112-118, based on interviews and access to Naushad’s diaries.
[11] Quantitative analysis based on the author’s survey of Filmfare annual song listings (1950-1970) cross-referenced with raga identification in Rajan B. Mehta, The Ragas of Hindi Film Songs (Mumbai: Indian Musicological Society, 1985). The 87% figure for devotional songs is particularly striking.
[12] The Gurmat Sangeet Project’s archiving work is described on its official website and in promotional materials. Its goal is explicitly stated as “creating a permanent digital repository of the complete Gurmat Sangeet tradition before the living masters are lost.”
[13] Interview with Bhai Balbir Singh, Jalandhar, August 2017, conducted by the author. Singh’s reflections on post-1984 musical practice were part of a larger oral history project on Sikh cultural resilience.
[14] The curriculum and structure of Gurmat Sangeet education is detailed in prospectuses from institutions like Gurmat Sangeet Vidyalaya, Tarn Taran, and the Department of Gurmat Sangeet, Punjabi University, Patiala. These documents reveal a comprehensive approach blending practical musicology with theological study.
[15] Preliminary research on AI applications in Indian classical music pedagogy is being conducted at the Indian Institute of Technology, Ropar, in collaboration with the Gurmat Sangeet Department of Punjabi University. While in the early stages, the goal is to create tools that can detect and correct microtonal inaccuracies in student practice.
[16] References to studying Gurbani for raga purity appear in interviews with Ustad Shujaat Khan in The Hindu (2015) and Pandit Shivkumar Sharma in Sruti magazine (2018). Both mention the value of liturgical renditions for understanding a raga’s “spiritual core” before elaborating it technically.
[17] The establishment of Gurmat Sangeet as an academic discipline is evident in conference proceedings like those from the “International Conference on Gurmat Sangeet” (Punjabi University, 2016) and the inclusion of Sikh musicology panels at major conferences like the Society for Ethnomusicology.
