Patwant Singh was a famous Sikh writer, commentator, journalist, editer and publisher, as well as a frequent TV presenter. He was born in New Delhi on March 28, 1925. He grew up and carried out his school and University education in Delhi. He began his career in the family business of building and engineering but soon merged these interests with his love for writing. He started up his first periodical, The Indian Builder, in 1953 as publisher. In 1957, he unveiled his most influential journal, Design, the only magazine of its kind in the world at that time.Design was a revolutionary magazine which brought together the latest thinking in the fields of architecture, urban planning, visual arts, graphics, and industrial design. Subject areas that, up to that point, had tended to have isolated audiences that rarely looked at or understood each other’s fields. The journal’s strongly interdisciplinary approach led Singh to begin pondering questions about why Bombay, Delhi and other urban areas in India were being developed in ways that ran counter to his aesthetic and humanitarian sensibilities. When he realized that the answers had less to do with architecture and more to do with politicians, government policies and corruption, he began publishing newspaper articles in the 1960s with the aim of affecting public opinion and official policies.
After 1984, Patwant Singh began to delve into Sikh issues, editing and contributing the opening essay of Punjab: The Fatal Miscalculation, which was published in 1985. The Golden Temple, published in 1989, aimed to be the definitive volume on the Harimandir Sahib and show how central this “fountainhead of inspiration” has been to Sikhs since its construction.
Of Dreams and Demons is Patwant Singh’s 1994 memoir, which highlights the intersections that connect his personal history to India’s history in the 1930s to the 1990s. He returned to the topics of religion and history with his 1999 publication, The Sikhs, a survey of Sikh history beginning with the historical context of South Asia before the time of the Gurus and stretching to the present day.
Garland Around My Neck was published at the beginning of March, 2001. It the remarkable Story of Puran Singh of Pingalwara. The book was co-written with Harinder Kaur Sekhon as a tribute to the remarkable humanitarian, Puran Singh who dedicated his life to sewa in order to bring a more healthy and humane world into existence. It is the real life story of Puran Singh (1904-92), a barefoot colossus who cared for the despairing, disabled and destitute with his own hands restoring to them the dignity of human existence that an uncaring society had denied them. After 23 years of personally caring for ever-increasing numbers of people who were unable to take care of themselves, in 1957, Puran Singh expanded his service to society by establishing Pingalwara, which now serves over 1,000 residents. Unlike a hospital, which has the aim of treating the sick, Pingalwara was built for people–disabled, poor, mentally ill, with terminal diseases–who needed hope and a home. Patwant Singh and Harinder Kaur Sekhon relied on Punjab’s rich tradition of oral history in researching this book.
Patwant Singh’s latest book is The World According to Washington: An Asian View, published in 2005. In this work, the author examines the often violent history of relations between western imperial powers and Asia, including East Asia, South Asia, and West Asia. His perspective is passionately critical of the destruction western interventionists have wrought in Asia, largely through valuing their own political and economic interests over the interests of Asians themselves–and by backing up these interests with firepower. First, Singh writes, there was a time when “Europeans considered the domination of Asia their birthright.”
Now, incursions of US troops, US-made arms, and coercive development plans are the strategies of the world’s only remaining superpower. When Washington, DC and those in its pocket write history and cover current events, their perspective is so imbalanced that the general public in the western world is now ignorant of even the most basic facts about Asia. The World According to Washington was conceived as a corrective and fills in the missing histories of US involvement and interests in hotspots such as—Iran, Indonesia, Korea, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, India and Pakistan.
Patwant Singh has also written extensively for newspapers and magazines and has appeared on both radio and television. His articles have appeared in many publications including the New York Times, Canada’s Globe and Mail, the UK’s Independent. Patwant Singh gave a lecture on July 22, 2006 at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York in conjunction with, I See No Stranger: Early Sikh Art and Devotion, an exhibition jointly sponsored by the Sikh Foundation and the Sikh Art and Film Foundation.
As Chairman of a family Trust, Patwant Singh established a unique rural medical facility in the state of Haryana in 1977. The Kabliji Hospital and Rural Health Centre is today acknowledged as a one-of-a-kind initiative in providing medical coverage and promoting preventive health in rural India. It was born out of Patwant Singh’s conviction that very little was being done for the medical and educational needs of the rural population in India, and that private initiative must play a role in providing these. A school was also founded next to the hospital a few years later. Both continue to flourish.
Patwant Singh will be remembered through his literary works and his charity.
Nikky-Gunninder Kaur is a Professor of Religion at Colby College in Maine, USA and she has written several books on Sikhism, focusing on the equality of Sikh women. Nikky received her BA in Philosophy and Religion from Wellesley College, her MA from the University of Pennsylvania and her PhD from Temple University.
Gurukirn Kaur Khalsa is an artist, poet and story writer. She is a creative person who rejoices in the beauty of spiritual life, nature and people who live inspiring lives. On her art she says that, "I try to find a point in time and space when something essential is revealed. By capturing these transformational moments, I have been able to create a number of iconic works which convey something greater than what the image or words portray." Gurukiran began studying art as a child and her mother would take her to art classes from ayoung age. She was born in Redlands, California. She knew she wanted to be an artist by the sixth grade. For high school she went to the Ethel Walker School, in Connecticut. Where she was in the company of other creative students and was able to explore art, crerative writing and modern dance. Whilst there she became the president of the Art Club in her senior year. She continued studying art in college, both at Pomona College and the University of California, Santa Barbara where she earned her BA in studio art. Whilst at Pomona College she met her spiritual teacher, Yogi Bhajan and took Yoga classes. She comments that, "I had been searching for a lifestyle with a deeper commitment to spirituality for some time, and the Sikh way of life that he shared with us, with the practice of daily sadhana as its foundation, fulfilled this longing." She has used her talents to share aspects of the Sikh lifestyle that have been important to her, for example inn 1994, she began the ‘Pure Longing’ series, writing a poem and making five paintings of a Sikh woman doing ishnaan seva. Presently, women are prohibited from doing this service of the early morning cleaning of the floors of the Golden Temple because of gender discrimination which ironically is not inkeepin with Sikh beliefs. Yogi Bhajan presented the poem and painting to the acting Jethadar of the Akal Takht and in 1996 she was one of a group who participated in the sewa, although the issue remains unsettled to this day. Gurukiran has a studio in Phoenix where she continue to write and paint. She has also published the books, Pure Longing Fulfilled (1999), which was written to commemorate the tercentenary celebration of the Khalsa in Anandpur Sahib, India in 1999 and Living with the Guru (2000), which is collection of Sikh stories from history for children. Famous Sikhs recommends that you visit Gurukirans website 
Hardeep Singh Kholi, born 1969 in Glasgow, is a writer, presenter, broadcaster and reporter. After studying law Hardeep was offered a job at BBC Radio Scotland and was chosen as one of a handful of prestigious BBC graduate production trainees. After two years of training in every department of the BBC Hardeep moved into directing Children's TV. In 1994 he was awarded a BAFTA and RTS Award for the kids' science show It'll Never Work. He starred in a comedy series Meet the Magoons for Channel 4 in the UK which he wrote and starred in with his brother Sanjeev Kohli. He presents the radio show Up All Night for BBC Radio 5 Live. He also wrote and presented a one-off documentary, In Search of the Tartan Turban for Channel 4, for which he won a BAFTA. He has also recently presented a series of documentaires titled Hardeep Does... where he tackles different topical issues. He has appeared twice on Question Time, the BBC's political panel programme. He also regularly appears on the One Show on BBC One and Newsnight Review on BBC two. Hardeep is an acid cook and has appeared on Celebrity Masterchef a cooking show in which he was runner-up. He grew up in a working class family and his parents ran a corner shop as well as working other jobs. His mum was a social worker and his dad a teacher, he says his mum was on her feet for 13 hours a day 7 days a week. He is currently a regular reporter on the One Show and presents Get 100 a childrens game show on CBBC. He was a Man Booker Prize judge for 2008, which is a literary prize awarded every year for the best original novel. He has himself written a book called Indian Takeaway released in 2008, in which he travels around India and cooks Bcottish dishes.
