Guru Har Krishan Ji, dying at Delhi in 1664 at seven, said only Baba Bakala, meaning his successor was at the village of Bakala.
Twenty-two men set themselves up at Bakala claiming the guruship. The village filled with rival establishments.
Makhan Shah Labana, a trader whose ship had been in trouble at sea and who had vowed five hundred gold coins, came to fulfil the vow. He offered two coins to each claimant in turn and each accepted. When he came to Tegh Bahadur, sitting apart, he was asked for the remaining four hundred and ninety-eight.
He is said to have gone up on the roof and shouted Guru ladho re, I have found the Guru. The phrase is proverbial in Punjabi.
Gurdwara Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur Sahib at Baba Bakala marks the place, and a very large fair is held there at Rakhar Punia in August.
Twenty-two false claimants and a merchant with an unpaid vow is the least reverent origin story in the tradition and the Panth has kept it exactly as it is.
Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji lived here in retirement before his succession, and the account of Makhan Shah Lubana finding him among the claimants is fixed to this village.
Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji had spent some twenty years at Bakala before this, farming and living quietly, which is why the direction pointed there and why he was sitting apart when the trader arrived.
The village holds a group of gurdwaras and the Raksha Bandhan fair. The account is about a succession dispute settled by a merchant, which is an unusual mechanism to have preserved.