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Begampurā (a land without sorrow) is a term coined in a poem[1] attributed to Ravidās[2], who is qualified as a bhagat according to the terminology of the Guru Granth[3]. A bhagat is a non-Sikh devotee, whose hymns have been included by the compilers of the Gur Granth as authoritative scripture, most of them belonging either to the Sufi-traditions or to the so-called nirguṇa-bhakti traditions in North India. The hymn which we are referring to, here, contains a visualization of an ideal if not utopian society.

The Begampurā hymn which we are referring in this paper contains a visualization of an ideal society on a philological basis;particularly based on an analysis of terminology.We have tried to trace its terminology and the development of an idea of radical change in the vision of state and society in the Guru Granth.This vision is partly utopian in the sense that it describes an alternative world that is never going to realize. At the same time, it shows the potential to break the idea of the world that the religion has to leave behind itself in order to enter the realm of God, i.e. attain salvation by complete indifference to the world.

It (the Begumpurā poem) was an expression, in the early modern age, of a utopia, possibly the first one in Indian literature," argues Gail Omvedt in her book "Seeking Begumpurā". In some ways ,it seems to stand alone, yet it was a harbinger of the kind of social vision that would underlie all the later struggles and theorising of anti- caste intellectuals.For Ravidās , Begumpurā was an imagined city that had neither a location nor a history; it was a task for a later period to construct it in both space and time.[4] Kanwal Bharti who is a progressive Ambedkarite thinker and writer says that Ravidās in his search for freedom due to the circumstances of his contemporary times, has imagined a griefless society called as Begumpurā . Through this verse, he expresses that Begumpurā, which is casteless, classless, and free of untouchability, is his ideal society. Nobody is taxed and nobody owns wealth. There is no unfairness, anxiety, fear, or torment in this society.[ 5]

Begampurā is so different in tone from most of the devotional bhakti songs that it may well have been preserved only because it was so remarkable because it drew for its audience of the poor .It was an expression, in the early modern age, of a utopia, perhaps the first one in Indian literature. Begampurā was for Ravidās  an imagined city, without a geographical location ,without a history though it was to be imagined in space and time. It is not accidental that Ravidās choose a largely Persian –Sanskrit name for his Begampurā, symbolizing both the end of sorrow and the confluence of dissimilating traditions.[6] But whether the creative possibilities that are opened up with the poem will be realized depends on a creative response from society. Begampurā remains to be translated into a vision appropriate to the new era. The hymn is to be seen as reflecting both a sense of poverty and caste humiliation, and a desire to conceptualise a utopia of urban space without social marginalization.

The focus is, first of all, on human suffering and fear. “Suffering” (dukh) – a central term in the Indian eschatological tradition in general, referring to the worldly status of men – and “anxiety” (aṃdohu) are the inside perspective of the experience of the subject, and the following lines demonstrate that this is not or at least not directly related to spiritual, but to worldly perspectives. The second next line once again refers to “fear”, this time using the Arabic term (in Sadhukkaṛī) [7]) khaufu (Arabic: ḥauf) as a human experience that is absent in the ideal state, which underlines inherently the presence of the same experience by the citizens in contemporary society. The juxtaposition of khaufu and dukh can be seen in a way as a reference to the similarity of experiences under Hindu-Indian as well of Muslim-Indian kingship: both are inherently characterized as a highly negative experience. It appears that Hindu as well as Muslim rulers were in the mind of the author while visualizing Begampurā.

The following verse directly refers to the non-hierarchical character of a society that obviously is contradicting the experiences of the society that the bhagat experiences in his contemporary context. It puts particular stress on equality (dom na sem aik so āhī). “Taxes” (khirāj) is a direct reference to the exploitation of subjects, while “commodities” (māl) refers to issues of unjust distribution.  This is a clear reference to the gap between the real and ideal state, worldly experiences that are understandable for any contemporary listener of the poem in the days of Ravidās as well as in the time of the beginning of the Sikh panth.

The term used to refer to Begampurā in special terms is vatan, an Arabic term used for the region that is perceived as one’s own in an emotional form of ownership, which in the 20th century lead to a semantic change into “nation”. The adjective khūb (vatan) may sound a bit unusual in this context. It further underlines the emotional, and I would argue the spiritual value of something that is inherent in the term vatan itself. It becomes clear that Begampurā is perceived not just in a metaphorical way as referring to some state of liberation difficult to define, but in a rather concrete way. Khūbvatan is a very clear notion to some kind of perceptible and even tangible reality, and at the same time signalized emotional involvement.

The most astonishing remark in this context somehow lies in the words “I have found” (gah pāī). This clearly means that Begampurā, even though it is described as contradicting the contemporary experience, is not nowhere, but present in some form. It can be identified and approached by its prospective citizen, i.e. the auctorial narrator/recitator/listener of the poem. Begampurā promises the khair of the persons living in it. The term khair has a broad semantic range from security to worldly well-being and from the worldly to the spiritual – it can among other usages also be found in blessings: May the Lord perform your khair. The basic point in this context is that it kind of relates the Begampurā in real terms to the emotional and to the eschatological. The different levels of meaning cannot be separated. This becomes again visible in the term pātisāhī in the next verse, which is attributed by kāimdāim. The term pādiśāh is the traditional title of the first Moghul emperor since Babur raised his kingdom in Kabul in 1504, and continued the title after the raid towards Delhi in 1526. Pātisāh is commonly used as a term relating to God himself in the Guru Granth, and pātisāhī is an abstract noun referring to divine kingdom. A common hailing slogan to the Moghul emperor in Persian is the wish that his kingdom may continue forever (kāyam). This is transferred here into the divine sphere, and again to Begampurā relating to the place to be given to the devotee in this kingdom. Again, inherently it is understood that the worldly pātisāh is not like this – since everyone knows that every ruler will one day pass away;I would read an inherent criticism into this verse.

Immediately after this highly theological and at the same time inherently political statement follows a hymn on equality. Again,this is a clear reference to the reality of the experience of social marginalization. Begampurā is not only about kingdom and subject hood, but also on the remedy of the evil of social hierarchy. Instead of this, the city is ābādān “populated” by a humankind that lives together in a non-hierarchical way together on a limited space: The city is the ideal, not the village or the solitude of the ascetic. And it is inhabited (māmūr) by a citizenship that is qualified as being wealthy (ganī) – i.e. a kind of worldly projection of a society beyond the common unjust distribution of wealth, in this case without any particular hint to a transcend state. It is interesting that the freedom of movement (sail karahi) is mentioned in this context beyond the question of wealth. In a feudal society the freedom to move is restricted, particularly for members of low castes.

The palace (mahal), in worldly terms the seat of the king and his unjust rule, is mahram – it is a friendly place in Begampurā, not a place of fear. And even Ravidās the camār – the tanner, a representative of a marginalized group in society – is “emancipated” (khalās) here and declares everyone his friend (mīt) who follows the rule of this utopian kingdom, which cannot be obstructed (aṭkāvai): Begampurā is powerful enough to become a reality.

Even though the word Begampurā doesn’t appear in the Guru Granth outside of this poem of Bhagat Ravidās, I argue that the concept itself can be identified in other contexts and related to other terms depending on the individual author or tradition of composing. The key point is the close relationship between terms pointing metaphorically or directly to a kind of non-worldly spiritual reality, for example to the court of the Lord himself (darbār)[8], and to the description of social relationships and state order in a historical reality that is always a kind of reference, whenever we come across the theological as such. (Rāmrājya)[9].

In a study of this nature, we have adopted descriptive and analytical methodology in a historical perspective.

Bhagat Ravidās visualises a state without a fear or grief, where everyone is supposed to be free from tension, worries, sufferings and pains. The reference to citizens who do not have to pay the taxes nor did they face injustice refers to the factual experience of these odds in the social and political reality the poet has to face in his historical reality. The vision of the ideal town is, therefore, counterfactual. Both rulers and the ruled were devoid of the voices of lust and greed and lived like one family in harmony .The king behaving as the “father” to the people as his children is the counter-image of the feudal lords in the experience of the marginalized. In other words, utopia is a land without grief or sorrow with the virtues of Rāmrājya and contains the principles of the welfare state. The Ravidās of the hymn Begampurā dreams of a society where there is no discrimination between a low and high caste and where ,a tanner was not despised or looked down upon by the high caste but honored by the fifth Guru Arjan Dev by including his prayers in his compilation of the Ādigranth. Egalitarianism was the order advocated by the Sikh Gurus in general. The major part of Ravidās’s hymns (padas)as a bhagat was collected by the fifth Sikh Guru ArjanDev, and incorporated into the later Guru Granth. Sikh Gurus interpret Ravidās as solidly nirguna poet which of course itself sees the divine in that way coinciding very much with the Sikh vision of the divine.[10 ] Even though the reference to Begampurā is to be found basically in the hymns of Guru Arjan Dev and Guru Nanak Dev in particular ,is conceptually inherent in the hymns of the Gurus in general as even in the hymns of bhagats.It is very much in the center of Gurbani.

Primary Sources Adi Sri Guru Granth Sahibji,( Sri Gurmat Press, [Standard Pagination],1604). Translation Singh,Gopal,Guru Granth Sahib,in four Vols.( Gurdas Kapoor and sons,Delhi,1964). Secondary Sources 1.Chander,Subhash, Dalit Mukti Ki Virasat Sant Ravidas, (Adhar Prakashan Pvt. Ltd.,2012) 2.Dhillon, G,S.,Sikh Religion and History,( Roxana Printers,Chandigarh,1991). 3.Kaur,Gurdeep, Political Ideas of the Sikh Gurus,( Deep and Deep Publications,Delhi,1990). 4.Omvedt, Gail,“Dalit Visions: The Anti-caste Movement and the Construction on an Indian Identity” ,( Orient Longman, Hyderabad, 2006) “Seeking Begumpura : The Social Vision of Anticaste Intellectuals, (Navayana Publications,New Delhi,2008) "Understanding Caste: From Buddha To Ambedkar And Beyond" (New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 2011) 5.Puri,Sunita,Advent of Sikh Religion: A Socio-Political Perspective,( Munshiram Manoharlala Publishers Pvt.Ltd.,New Delhi,1993). Sankhdher,M.M.,The Concept of Welfare State,( University of Delhi,1974). 6.Singh, Khushwant,A History of The Sikhs,2 Vols,( Princeton University Press,New Jersey,1978). 7. Upadhyaya,K.N.,“Guru Ravidas: Life and Teachings” (Radah Soami Satsang Beas ,Punjab,1990) 8. Wessler, H., Indian literature and religion In: Brill's Encyclopedia of Hinduism. Volume Two: Sacred Texts, Ritual Traditions, Arts, Concepts, Knut A. Jacobsen (editor), (Brill Academic Pub. 659-667, 2010).

1. Sri Guru Granth Sahib.,p.345.
Begampurā Hymn in Gurbani

ਬੇਗਮ ਪੁਰਾ ਸਹਰ ਕੋ ਨਾਉ॥
Begam purā sahar ko nāu
Baygampura, 'the city without sorrow', is the name of the town.
“ਦੂਖੁ ਅੰਦੋਹੁ ਨਹੀ ਤਿਹਿ ਠਾਉ॥
Dūkhu aṃdohu nāhī teihei ṭhāu
There is no suffering or anxiety there.
ਨਾਂ ਤਸਵੀਸ ਖਿਰਾਜੁ ਨ ਮਾਲੁ॥
nāṃ tasavīs khiīrāju na mālu
There are no troubles or taxes on commodities there.
ਖਉਫੁ ਨ ਖਤਾ ਨ ਤਰਸੁ ਜਵਾਲੁ॥
khauphu na khatā na tarasu javālu
There is no fear, blemish or downfall there.
ਅਬ ਮੋਹਿ ਖੂਬ ਵਤਨ ਗਹ ਪਾਈ॥
ab mohai khūb vatan gah pāī
Now, I have found this most excellent city.
ਊਹਾਂ ਖੈਰਿ ਸਦਾ ਮੇਰੇ ਭਾਈ॥
ūhāṃ khairi sadā mere bhāī
There is lasting peace and safety there, O Siblings of Destiny.
ਕਾਇਮੁ ਦਾਇਮੁ ਸਦਾ ਪਾਤਿਸਾਹੀ॥
Kāimu dāimu sāadā pātaisāhī
God's Kingdom is steady, stable and eternal.
ਦੋਮ ਨ ਸੇਮ ਏਕ ਸੋ ਆਹੀ॥
dom na som ek so aāhī
There is no second or third status; all are equal there.
ਆਬਾਦਾਨੁ ਸਦਾ ਮਸਹੂਰ॥
Ābādānu sadā mashūr
That city is populous and eternally famous.
ਊਹਾਂ ਗਨੀ ਬਸਹਿ ਮਾਮੂਰ॥
ūhāṃ ganī basahīi māmūr
Those who live there are wealthy and contented.
ਤਿਉ ਤਿਉ ਸੈਲ ਕਰਹਿ ਜਿਉ ਭਾਵੈ॥
tiu tiu sail karahi jiu bhāvai
They stroll about freely, just as they please.
ਮਹਰਮ ਮਹਲ ਨ ਕੋ ਅਟਕਾਵੈ॥
maharam mahal na ko aṭtakāvai
They know the Mansion of the Lord's Presence, and no one blocks their way.
ਕਹਿ ਰਵਿਦਾਸ ਖਲਾਸ ਚਮਾਰਾ॥
kahei ravidās khalās camārā
Says Ravi Daas, the emancipated shoe-maker:
ਜੋ ਹਮ ਸਹਰੀ ਸੁ ਮੀਤੁ ਹਮਾਰਾ॥
jo ham saharī su mītu hamārā
Whoever is a citizen there, is a friend of mine”
2. For our context, it is not important to discuss the question of historical authorship. To be precise, when we refer to “Ravidās”, we mean “the Ravidās-tradition”.
3. i.e. Guru Granth Sāhib.Even though the scripture is rather not a list of rules of ethics and law in the nīti-tradition, neither a book on faith dogmatic, but a collection of hymns, it nevertheless contains all kinds of ethical, judicial and theological statements.
4. See Gail Omvedt, “Dalit Visions: The Anti-caste Movement and the Construction on an Indian Identity”,( Orient Longman, Hyderabad, 2006).
5. See Kanwal Bharti,”Raidas Saheb and the idea of Begumpura” https://www.forwardpress.in/2019/03/raidas-saheb-and-the-idea-of-begumpura/
6. See Gail Omvedt, “Seeking Begumpura: The Social Vision of Anticaste Intellectuals”, (New Delhi, Navayana, 2009).
7. Sadhukkaṛī: The language of the Guru Granth is basically a mixed language spoken all over North India by the Saints.
8. Sri Guru Granth Sahib,p.97.
9. Ibid.,p.454.
10. See Gail Omvedt, “Seeking Begumpura; The social vision of Anticaste Intellectuals”,(New Delhi,2008),p.92.