GAURĀ, BHĀĪ, the elder son of Bhāī Bhagatū (d. 1652), a devout and leading Sikh since the time of Gurū Arjan, was a brave warrior who had carved out an extensive estate for himself around his native village Viñjhū, 14 km north of Baṭhiṇḍā (30º-14'N, 74º-59'E) . Owing to a misunderstanding, Bhāī Bhagatū, while on his last visit to Kartārpur to see Gurū Har Rāi in 1651, had made a young peasant girl believe that he had vowed to make her his wife. The girl considered herself the wife of the old Bhāī, who had died soon after the incident, and would not remarry. When Gaurā came to know this, he brought the girl to his house and ever treated her as his mother. The following year, when Gurū Har Rāi visiting saṅgats in the Mālvā region, came to Viñjhū, Gaurā served him devotedly and accompanied the Gurū's train through his own neighbourhood. One day, angered by an insulting remark made by Jassā, one of the Gurū's attendants, about his stepmother, Gaurā had the former assassinated. Gurū Har Rāi forbade Gaurā's presence in saṅgat. Gaurā was repentant and wanted to tender apology but the Gurū would not grant him an audience. He, with a few hundred of his men, therefore followed the Gurū's progress to Kīratpur, keeping a few kilometres behind him. A few months later as Gurū Har Rāi, on his way to Kartārpur, had just crossed the River Sutlej, his family and the baggage still on the other bank, a Mughal force attacked his rear. But Bhāī Gaurā, who as usual was following close behind, chased the attackers away and helped the Gurū's party safely cross the river. When Gurū Har Rāi came to know of this, he called Gaurā to his presence, pardoned his past crime and giving him his blessing sent him back to his home in the Mālvā, where he flourished as a virtual ruler of a vast tract. One of his descendants, Bhāī Desū Siṅgh, founded the autonomous state of Kaithal in 1767.