According to Sikh tradition two Nishan Sahib banners were said to have been first placed in front of the Akal Takht in 1606 by Guru Hargobind. Gulati, Kailash Chander, The Akalis: Past and Presen t. The Miri-Piri Nishan Sahib banners that stand in front of the Akal Takht today have a unique history. The last prominent Nihang known as an Akali was Akali Kaur Singh (18861953). A rival body set up in mid 1930's also named itself the Central Akali Dal. Even the reform movement itself was referred to as the Akali movement. During the Gurdwara reform movement (192025), the term Akali came to be associated with the reformers who organized themselves into a political body, the Shiromani Akali Dal. In the 1892 census only 1,376 persons were returned as "Sikh Akalis or Nihangs," and in 1901 this number further came down to a bare 431, besides 136 who registered themselves as Akalis by caste. After the occupation of the Punjab by the British in 1849, Akali regiments were disbanded and, military service being their only career, their numbers dwindled rapidly.
Phula Singh's Akalis formed the crack brigade in Maharaja RANJIT Singh's army as well as the custodians of the nation's conscience and morals. 1823), one time ward and disciple of Naina Singh. Akalis became prominent as an organized force under Akali Phula Singh (d. Akali Naina Singh is credited with introducing the tall pyramidal turban common among the Nihangs to this day. It was probably from this warcry that the Singhs or initiated Sikhs, variously called Bhujangis and Nihangs, came also to be known as Akalis.Īlthough the Nihangs trace their origin from Sahibzada Fateh Singh, the youngest son of Guru Gobind Singh or from Bhai Man Singh, a Sikh of the Tenth Guru, the earliest use of Akali as a title appears with the name of Naina Singh, an eighteenthcentury Nihang warrior and a junior leader in the Shahid misl. When he instituted, in 1699, the Khalsa, a body of warriors initiated through baptism of the doubleedged sword, he gave them the warcry "Sat Sri Akal !" (theTrue, the Radiant, the Timeless One). A set of his hymns is entitled Akal Ustat (meaning "God`s Praises"). It was, however, Guru Gobind Singh who popularized the term Akal as an attributive name of God. Guru Hargobind (1595-1644), who adopted a royal style, named his seat at Amritsar, Akal Takhat. Guru Nanak (1469-1539) described God as Akal Murat, the Eternal Form. The term Akali is originally from Akal, the Timeless One.
The word Nihang is from the Persian nihang meaning crocodile, alligator, shark or water dragon, and signifies qualities of ferocity and fearlessness. However, the word Akali, a term now appropriated by members of the dominant Sikh political party, the Shiromani Akali Dal, founded in 1920, and groups splitting from it from time to time, was earlier used for Nihangs (q.v.), an order of armed religious zealots among the baptized Sikhs. Akali is a word which is derived from the Punjabi, Akal, the death-less being.