Baba Ram Singh gathers his followers at Bhaini Sahib and founds the movement later called Namdhari, or Kuka, for its ecstatic cries in worship; his Sikhs wear white homespun, reject colonial goods, courts, and posts, and keep a parallel administration of their own, an early rehearsal of non-cooperation.
The Event
- Date
- 1857 (approximate)
- Era
- Reform and Colonial; Standard periodization of Sikh history
- Location
- Bhaini Sahib; today Ludhiana, Punjab, India
- Traditions
- Sikhism
- Streams
- Namdhari
- Key figures
- Baba Ram Singh
Primary Sources
- The colonial records of the Kuka movement
Secondary Sources
- Fenech and McLeod, Historical Dictionary of Sikhism (Rowman and Littlefield, 3rd ed. 2014)
- Khushwant Singh, A History of the Sikhs, vol. 1 (Oxford, 2nd ed. 2004)
Provenance: HIST-0521; confidence 0.85; accessed 2026-10-27.
Related on This Site
- Baba Ram Singh exiled to Burma History Event
- Death of Baba Ram Singh in exile History Event
- The Kuka outbreak and the Malerkotla executions History Event
- Punjabi Language
- Sant Bhasha Language
- Ardas Prayer or Creed
- Nitnem Prayer or Creed
- Sikhism World View