2008 KRI Honorees

The Kundalini Research Institute is pleased to announce the recipients of our 2007 Outstanding Achievement Awards for their contributions to the legacy of The Teachings of Yogi Bhajan: Harijot Kaur and Karta Purkh Singh Khalsa.

Harijot Kaur

Pick up any one of the Kundalini Yoga manuals put together by Harijot Kaur and you can well understand why KRI has chosen to honor her this year for her service to the legacy of The Teachings of Yogi Bhajan. The manuals she has generated over the years are easy to use, aesthetically beautiful, and set an impeccable standard of authenticity. She has diligently researched, verified, and organized Yogi Bhajan’s teachings with meticulous attention to every detail. Harijot’s own carefully crafted original drawings illustrate each manual. In the true spirit of seva, consciously serving the Master, she has offered her time, energy, and skill to these endeavors.

She started her work with the manual, Physical Wisdom, which is being edited for a second edition as this goes to press. This initial volume was followed by others in that same series: Reaching Me in Me, The Owner’s Manual for the Human Body, Self-Experience, Self-Knowledge, and Infinity & Me. More recently she collected and published all the Master’s teachings on the breath in Praana, Praanee, Praanayam. She also collaborated with Guru Prem Singh (dubbed “Posture Master” by Yogi Bhajan) on Divine Alignment. A gifted, multi-talented yogi, Harijot also teaches Kundalini Yoga at Yoga West in Los Angeles, California.

In 1975, Harijot was living in Ashland, Oregon, when a friend persuaded her to go to a White Tantric Yoga Course that the Mahan Tantric, Yogi Bhajan, was going to conduct. She had never heard of him, but she went. As soon as the Master saw her he recognized her destiny and told her she should come to Los Angeles. Without hesitation, she did. Quitting her job and leaving her friends and her life in Oregon behind, she came to Los Angeles and went to work at the Golden Temple Restaurant. One job led to another within the “3HO” family of business and when a bookkeeper was needed, she learned bookkeeping and discovered she was good at it. Ultimately, she found herself at the Secretariat in the accounting department where she still serves today. KRI is proud to acknowledge Harijot Kaur with their 2007 Outstanding Achievement in Service Award.

Karta Purkh Singh Khalsa

Yogaraj Ayurvedic Herbalist
In Kundalini Yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan®

For his lifetime of study and his contributions toward the compilation and cataloging of Yogi Bhajan’s teachings in herb technology, foods, and the healing arts, Karta Purkh Singh Khalsa is recognized as the Yogaraj Ayurvedic Herbalist in Kundalini Yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan.®

Karta Purkh Singh met Yogi Bhajan in 1973 and at his direction, began the study of herbs. Over the next few years, Yogi Bhajan began training Karta Purkh directly. Yogi Bhajan was very prolific and had Karta Purkh generate hundreds of prototypes of various new medicines. In 1980, Yogi Bhajan had Karta Purkh Singh start Yogic Herbs, and shortly afterward, Karta Purkh began his own private company Herb Technology.

Since 1973, Karta Purkh Singh has been working as an herbalist and nutritionist in private practice as well as teaching herbs and herbal technology. He founded Seattle’s first multidisciplinary natural healing clinic and ran it for almost 20 years. Involved in formulating Yogi Tea for the past 20 years, for the past 10 years, Karta Purkh has been an employee of KIIT where he serves as a researcher and analyst for teas, cereals, and body products in the Technical Services Department of Golden Temple.

He continues to practice privately and to write extensively.

KRI is proud to acknowledge Karta Purkh Singh Khalsa with their 2007 Outstanding Achievement in Service Award.