KHURSHĪD KHĀLSĀ (khurshīd lit. the sun --- rays of the sun) is a book in Urdu pertaining to the history of the Sikhs from the time of Gurū Nānak published at Āftāb-i-Hind Press in Lahore in 1885. The book caused a considerable amount of controversy in contemporary Sikhism. Already riven into two factions, the Amritsar and Lahore groups, the antagonism between the two --- one espousing the cause of Mahārājā Duleep Siṅgh, the deposed sovereign of the Punjab, and the other openly hostile to him --- sharpened. Members of the Kūkā sect were the principal supporters of the Mahārājā. The book written by Bāvā Nihāl Siṅgh, an employee of Mahārājā Bikram Siṅgh of Farīdkoṭ , contained passages favourable to Mahārājā Duleep Siṅgh, who had by then turned a foe of the British. The Lahore party objected and asked the author to withdraw the book. At celebrations in honour of Gurū Nānak's birth, a portrait of Duleep Siṅgh was displayed by the Amritsar leaders in the presence of the Gurū Granth Sāhib which was resented by the Lahore party. In October 1885 Gurmukh Siṅgh, secretary of the Khālsā Dīwān Lahore, issued a letter clearing the Dīwān of any connection with the publication and throwing the entire responsibility on the author and the publisher. The author had the implicit support of the Amritsar faction. The book was considered to be subversive of the Sikh tenets and the author was expelled from the membership of the Siṅgh Sabhā.

Sardār Siṅgh Bhāṭīā