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CHAPTER THREE
Punjabi Tractarian Movement
Father of Modem Punjabi Literature / 29
Bhai Vir Singh wished to set himself up independently in
sometrade andwasnotattractedbytheofferofgovernment
service. He decided finally to start a printing press--a scheme
Which fell in with the larger purpose he had in his mind. In
collaboration with his friend Wazir Singh, he established a
lithograph press in Amritsar in 1892. It was called Wazir-i­
Hind Press after the name of his partner, he himself
characteristically remaining in anonymity. The press
prospered and became the largest establishment of his kind
in the city. All of Bhai Vir Singh's works were printed here.
The following year he founded the Khalsa Tract Society.
The idea probably came from the example of similar Christian
institutions which had been in existence in India for some
timefor thepropagationoftheGospel. In 1848hadbeenformed
in Agra the Christian Tract and Book Society, on the model of
the Religious Tract Society in London, by Dr Karl Gottlieb
Pifander, missionary to the Muslim world, who had written
and published through it his well-knownMizan-ul-Haqq, the
Balance of Truth, a defence of Christianity against Muslim
objections. 1 An American Tract Society and a Bible Society
also existed for which literature was printed at the Lodiana
Mission Press. A separate Bible and Tract Society was
constituted for the Punjab in 1863.
1. See 1.1. Lucas, History ofthe North India Christian Tract and Book Society,
Allahabad, pp.1-8.
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