KARTĀR SIṄGH DĀKHĀ, PAṆḌIT (1888-1958), scholar, grammarian and theologian, was born the son of Rām Siṅgh on 13 September 1888 at Dākhā, a village 16 Km southwest of Ludhiāṇā along the Ludhiāṇā-Fīrozpur highway. After receiving elementary education in his village, he was admitted to Khālsā Collegiate School, Amritsar, but owing to his father's death in 1907, he left off without taking the matriculation examination and joined the Nirmalā Ḍerā at Ṭhikrīvālā, in the former princely state of Paṭiālā, to learn Sanskrit from Paṇḍit Basant Siṅgh. Besides Sanskrit, he was nurtured at the Ḍerā in Sikh scriptures and he passed out as a learned scholar and practised debater. He worked for a time as a teacher in Khālsā Prachārak Vidyālā, Tarn Tāran. Later, when Sikh Missionary College was opened at Amritsar in 1923, Paṇḍit Kartār Siṅgh joined the faculty as a lecturer. Returning to his native village, Dākhā, he took to preaching, travelling extensively in the Punjab and Uttar Pradesh. In 1933-38 he taught at Gurmat Updeshak College, Damdamā Sāhib, Talvaṇḍī Sābo in Baṭhiṇḍā district, also known as Gurū Kāshī. There he brought out a missionary journal, Gurū Kāshī Pattar, which was later shifted to Ludhiāṇā and ultimately to Dākhā itself. During 1938-39, Paṇḍit Kartār Siṅgh, accompanied by Giānī Gurcharan Siṅgh of Muktsar, took out a tour to Singapore and Malaya at the invitation of the Sikhs living in those countries. On return from there, he served for some time as a lecturer in divinity at Gurū Hargobind Khālsā College, Gurūsar Sadhār, l0 km south of Dākhā. He also served in the Punjab Languages Department at Paṭiālā from 1951-53. He died of heart attack on 25 November 1958 at Qilā Rāipur, a village 18 km south of Ludhiāṇā.

         Paṇḍit Kartār Siṅgh Dākhā was a prolific writer. His published works included books on linguistics, philosophy, prosody, grammar, commentaries on sacred texts, some of the titles being Hindī ate Gurmukhī Lipī te Vichār (1931), Gurmukhī ate Hindī dā Ṭākrā (1949), Nyāi Paribhāshā (1929), Gurū Kāvya Darshan Arthāt Piṅgal (1913), Alaṅkār Nirṇaya (n.d.), Navīn Punjabi Piṅgal (n.d.), Srī Gurū Vyakaraṇ Pañchāiṇ (1945), Mālve dā Political ltihās (n.d.) Srī Japu Nīsān (1951), Das Dohare te Vīh Savaiyye Saṭīk (n.d.), Gurū Pad Nirṇaya (n.d.), Bhagautī Maṇḍan (1963), and two pamphlets on Rāgmālā controversy (1946). Besides, his articles and serialized Punjabi translation of the Ṛg Veda appeared in Gurū Kāshī Pattar.