 "Singh, who passed away at 92 at New Delhi’s All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) on Thursday night, spent his early years in a tiny village in Pakistan. PTI")
In Gah, a small village around 100km southwest of Islamabad, the air was heavy with grief as residents gathered after Friday prayers to mourn a man who had once called this village home – Dr Manmohan Singh.
“The entire village is in mourning. We feel that someone from our family has died today,” Altaf Hussain, a local teacher told PTI, as villagers came together to remember their beloved ‘Mohna,’ who rose to prominence as India’s 14th Prime Minister.
Singh, who passed away at 92 at New Delhi’s All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) on Thursday night, spent his early years in a tiny village in Pakistan.
To this day, Singh was one of their own. Despite the partition and decades of separation, his journey to the corridors of power in India remained a source of connection and pride.
Here’s a closer look at Manmohan Singh’s time at this tiny village.
‘I played, while Mohna prepared for exams’
It was in Gah Begal village, now part of Chakwal district in Pakistan’s Punjab province, that former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was born on September 26, 1932.
His father, Gurmukh Singh Kohli, worked as a clerk for a dry fruits trader, while his mother, Amrit Kaur, passed away when Singh was just five months old. Raised by his paternal grandmother, Jamna Devi, Singh grew up in humble surroundings.
His early education began at the local primary school in Gah, where his admission details are still treasured: admission number 187, dated April 17, 1937, his caste as ‘Kohli’.
Ghulam Mustafa, then the village school’s headmaster told The Dawn, “We still show this to our students. We tell them that one of them could be like him. I tell them, ‘Manmohan Singh studied right here, in these classrooms.’"
Some of Singh’s classmates were alive when he became India’s Prime Minister in 2004, but many have since passed away. Their families, however, still hold on to memories of those days and cherish the connection.
Muhammad Zaman, son of Muhammad Ashraf, fondly recalled his father’s reaction when he learned of his best friend’s rise to the post of prime minister, “My father ran to me and said, ‘Oye, apna Mohna Hindustan da wazeer ho gaya!’ (Our Mohna has become India’s prime minister!).”
Zaman further said, “The entire village danced that night. Even those who had never met Singh, felt proud…Father used to tell me bedtime stories of Mohna. He made him sound like a hero from our village folk tales. ‘He studied under candlelight,’ my father used to say. ‘While I played in the fields, Mohna was preparing for exams.’”
Singh stayed in Gah’s school until the age of 10, when he moved to Peshawar to live with his father and continue his education. After the partition in 1947, he relocated to Amritsar, where the Singh family started a new life.
Ashraf, remained in Pakistan, however their bond didn’t change with turbulent times.
“Sixty-five years ago, the land was divided…and so were we,” Ashraf, who passed away in 2010, said at the time. “But friendships like ours, they can’t be partitioned.”
Also read: Why Manmohan Singh was always spotted wearing a blue turban
A man of his words
Though years passed, the connection between Gah Begal and Manmohan Singh never wavered. Even after Singh became India’s Prime Minister, he remained deeply rooted in the memories of his birthplace.
Raja Ashiq Ali, a local and nephew of Singh’s friend told ThePrint, “I feel immense pleasure to share that Manmohan Singh was such a man of the word that in 2004, he told me through his principal secretary that [village] upliftment projects would soon be underway, and then, we witnessed unprecedented development.”
According to local residents, Singh helped fund the renovation of the village school, establish a hospital, and solar-powered lighting systems.
India’s The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) played a pivotal role in these development projects. They installed two power micro grids in Gah. This included 51 solar-based domestic lighting systems, 16 solar streetlights, and solar heaters in three mosques.
In 2008, Singh extended a personal invitation to his schoolmate, Raja Muhammad Ali, for a visit to New Delhi—a meeting that became a treasured memory for the villagers.
“He took shawls and shoes for him. I sent him Chakwali ‘rawori.’ Raja asked him to visit Gah, but the Mumbai attacks happened, and everything changed,” Ashraf had recalled.
While Singh was unable to visit Gah during his lifetime, the news of his passing plunged the village into deep sorrow. “We wanted to participate in his last rituals, but we know that it is not possible for us,” said Ali.
He added, “All of the villagers yearned for the arrival of Manmohan Singh, but unfortunately, he could not come to Gah. Now, we ardently wait to receive his wife and daughters in Gah.”
With input from agencies