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BHAI BIDHI CHAND CHHINA
Grandson of Bhikhi and son of Vassan, Bhai Bidhi Chand was a great warrior and a perspicacious religious preacher of the time of Guru Hargobind ji. He was a Chhina Jatt of the village of Sursingh, 35 km south of Amritsar. In his younger days Bidhi Chand had fallen into bad company and taken to banditry. One day, a pious Sikh, Bhai Adah of the village of Chohla, led him into Guru Arjun dev ji's presence. Bidhi Chand wished no longer to return home and decided to dedicate the rest of his life to the service of the service of Guru.
He was one of the five Sikhs chosen to accompany Guru Arjun dev ji on his journey to Lahore where he was martyred in 1606. Guru Hargobind ji chose him to be one of the commanders of the armed force he had raised and he displayed as a soldier great feat of valor in battles with the imperial troops.
His best-known exploit, however, was the recovery of two horses, Dilbag and Gulbag, from the stables of the governor of Lahore. The horses belonged to a Sikh who was bringing them from Kabul as an offering for Guru Hargobind ji, but they were seized on the way by the Mughal satrap. The first horse Bidhi Chand recovered disguised as a hay-seller, and the second disguised as an astrologer.
Besides being a brave warrior, Bidhi Chand was well-versed in Sikh lore and tenet. To fulfil a promise he had made to a Muslim saint, Sundar Shah, he went to Devnagar to spend the last days of his life. The two friends spent three days reflecting together on the teaching of Guru Nanak Dev ji, wherefore both died at the same time (14 August 1640). Sundar Shah's disciples buried the one in accordance with Muslim rites and cremated the other in accordance with Sikh rites, and raised shrines in their honour. Some time later, Lal Chand, a nephew of Bhai Bidhi Chand, brought from the site of his shrine at Devnagar some earth over which he built a samadh in his ancestral village, Sursingh.