Dr. Tejpal Singh Dhillon

On May 15, 1941, Tejpal Singh Dhillon was born in Peshawar, British-occupied India, to Dr. Harnand Singh Dhillon and Sardarni Mohinder Kaur Dhillon (née Randhawa). Dr. Harnand Singh Dhillon’s ancestral village was Gandiwind (Punjab), and Mohinder Kaur’s village was Sansara (Punjab). At the time of his birth, Dr. Harnand Singh Dhillon was stationed in Peshawar serving as a physician in the British Army during World War II. Tejpal Singh and his elder brother Harpal Singh were the only surviving children of their parents.

From Peshawar, the family moved to Lahore, Punjab, where Tejpal Singh and Harpal Singh spent their early youth. As India’s Partition loomed, the family moved briefly to Amritsar. Following Partition in 1947, they moved to Una (Himachal) for a period of time, where Dr. Harland Singh Dhillon was posted as a civil medical officer. In the weeks after “The Great Divide, "when millions lost their lives in Punjab on both sides of the border, the Dhillon family—led by Tejpal Singh’s mother Mohinder Kaur—hosted and cared for dozens of displaced friends and family in their Una home. The turmoil of Partition left a strong, indelible impression on the younger Tejpal Singh and his family.

Following World War II, Dr. Harnand Singh Dhillon joined the Indian Medical civil service as a physician in Punjab, and he was stationed in various places during Tejpal Singh’s youth. From age 7 to 12, Tejpal Singh stayed with his paternal aunt, Mohinder Kaur Dhillon, a physician, also in the Medical civil service in Himachal Pradesh, where he attended different schools during this time. Always an avid sportsman, Tejpal formed and led a cricket team as captain in Himachal, he organized competitions with other cricketers. He continued to play cricket in friendly competition well into his 60s.

During school holidays, Tejpal Singh, his older brother Harpal Singh and their cousin Vijaypal Singh were inseparable friends, often visiting their maternal village of Sansara and indulging in mischief. From age 12 on, Tejpal Singh completed his schooling in Samrala. He and Harpal Singh were treated to classical Indian musical lessons as children, anchoring his lifelong love of music.

He completed his 10th grade studies at A.S. High School in Khanna, Punjab. He completed his Pre-Medical Studies at Government College in Ludhiana from 1954 to 1956, graduating with “First Division” exam scores. His principal describes his “general behavior” as “laudable” and his “moral character” as “very good.” In addition, the educator also described him as “a cultured lad of varied interests.” Tejpal’s school records indicate that he was a member of the “First Cricket Eleven,” a team that finished as first runners up in the District High Schools Tournament.

Tejpal Singh attended medical school at Punjab University’s Medical College in Amritsar, Punjab (a school with a strong family association). He was a popular student, an active athlete and loved social activities with his friends, and riding his Motorcycle. Tejpal was well known for playing practical jokes on his friends in medical school. He made lifelong friends there, many of whom also emigrated to the United States like him. He graduated from medical school with his bachelor’s degree in medicine, and surgery (M.B.B.S.) in 1963.

Tejpal Singh decided that he wanted to pursue a career in orthopedic surgery while in medical school. He did his medical internship at Rohtak Amritsar after medical school. He completed an extensive post-graduate training program at the prestigious Post-Graduate Institute (“PGI) Chandigarh in 1965. He spent three and a half years working under the tutelage of Doctor Daljit Singh Grewal. He began as a medical resident, then registrar in Orthopedic Surgery, and spending his last 18 months at PGI as registrar in orthopedic surgery.

As Tejpal Singh neared the end of his medical training at PGI, he decided he wanted to enter the next phase of life, get married and start raising a family. With family assistance, he was introduced to Parminder Kaur Bajwa, the daughter of Dr. Singh and Harvant Kaur Bajwa. At the time, Parminder was a student of home economics at Lady Irwin College in Delhi, where her father, an Air Force officer, was stationed. After a year-long engagement, the two married at her parents’ family home in Chandigarh on August 6, 1967.

Tejpal and Parminder welcomed their first child, daughter Harmeet Kaur, on October 2, 1968. She was born at PGI in Chandigarh. Like many of his classmates, Tejpal had a desire to go to the United States to practice medicine. However, at the time, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, fearing a “brain drain,” took draconian measures to prevent India’s physicians from leaving the country, ordering the revocation of physician passports and banning the U.S. medical exam for foreign graduates, ECFMG (Educational Council for Foreign Medical Graduates), from being offered in India. Eventually doctors won the right to keep their own passports but had to travel to foreign countries in order to take the U.S. required medical exam.

Tejpal traveled to the UK in 1969 to take the ECFMG exam, and to continue his orthopedics training while waiting for an opportunity to finish training in the US. He started at a hospital in Leigh, Lancshire, and then continued in Wigan, Lancashire. Parminder joined Tejpal with their daughter Harmeet later in 1969, and the family was joined by a son, Mandeep Singh, born in Billinge, Lancashire, U.K. on June 2, 1970.

When an opportunity to travel to the U.S. for medical residency arose, Tejpal traveled across the Atlantic where he was quickly deemed over-qualified for the first position, he had been offered in Worcester, Mass. He then successfully completed a one-year residency in general surgery at Grasslands Hospital in Valhalla, NY in 1972, and then completed his medical training as chief resident in orthopedics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx, New York City, where he worked for three years, finishing in 1975. He also worked on the attending staff at Blythdale Hospital for Handicapped Children in New York City.

As Tejpal was completing his medical training at the highest levels of his chosen profession, he faced a crossroads as to where to begin his medical practice. Many of his classmates and friends had decided to pursue academic careers in large university hospitals, staying near large cities. Tejpal himself had excelled at Albert Einstein school of Medicine, part of Yeshiva University, and was offered a faculty position at the medical school, but Tejpal wanted to raise his family in a more agrarian environment, and with a balanced lifestyle reminiscent of the Punjab of his youth. He found the right opportunity when the family took a road trip to Disney World in Orlando, Florida, in their second-hand Chevy Impala.

While driving from New York to Florida, Tejpal looked up one of his Amritsar Medical College classmates, Devinder Sharma, in small-town, Smithfield, North Carolina – the county seat of rural Johnston County’s farming community. Dr. Sharma told Tejpal that the county had been looking for an orthopedic specialist for two years, and Tejpal liked what he saw. The family visited Disney World, and on the way back to New York, they stopped again in Smithfield, met the Johnston County Memorial Hospital administrator, the president of the local bank, and a realtor. Before they left Smithfield, the Dhillon family had purchased a home, obtained a mortgage, and Dr. Dhillon was on his way to getting medical admitting privileges in Smithfield. The family returned to New York so that he could finish his residency, packed up their possessions from student housing, and moved to Smithfield in 1975, settling outside the county limits on Brogden Road, amidst tobacco, cotton, and soybean fields. Tejpal wanted to build a life where he could work a full day in his challenging profession, but also enjoy sports and be an integral part of his family’s life; he found that in Smithfield.

The move to Smithfield began an important chapter in the Dhillon family’s life. They were finally able to put down roots. Tejpal, an avid sportsman in medical school, built the tennis court he had dreamed of in followed by a swimming pool in the Smithfield home. The family joined the Johnston County Country Club, where Tejpal, a highly competitive tennis player, regularly won trophies in his age group. His children learned to swim, play tennis and golf both at the club and at home. Tejpal started his private medical practice in Smithfield, and the children enrolled in elementary school in Johnston County’s public schools. The family traded in the old green Chevy Impala for Tejpal’s long-coveted white Jaguar XJ12 with red leather seats. This vehicle was regularly driven in excess of the speed limits on the back roads of Johnston County. It was Tejpal’s favorite car, though it was a high maintenance beast that he eventually had to replace for a more reliable one.

The family settled into the routine of a country life in the south. Tejpal regularly hosted annual parties at the home on Brogden Road for the entire medical community of Johnston County, in the form of a traditional “pig pickin’” barbecue complete with a whole hog, coleslaw, hush puppies, and biscuits.

Despite the rural setting, he made it his mission to stay up to date on the most cutting-edge medical procedures in his field. He specialized in hand and spine surgery. He brought pioneering arthroscopic surgery techniques to Johnston County well before other rural communities had access to them. Tejpal Dhillon was inducted as a fellow of the International College of Surgeons and as a fellow of the American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons, distinguished honors in his field, in 1976.

Now that the family had a settled home, Tejpal and Parminder regularly entertained, hosting family parties for other Indian American doctors, classmates, and more. Children were always welcome at these parties, where Punjabi, Hindi and Urdu music classics were played. He and his dear friend Dr. Sharma were also known to enact their own dramatic versions of Kathak dances in a comic fashion during these parties. No party was complete without a performance, stories of old times from medical school, and good-natured laughter.

Tejpal had a love for Indian classical music, Punjabi folk music and poetry, and Urdu ghazals (poetry). His parents hired a music tutor for he and his brother in Punjab, and later in life Tejpal continued this tuition. He learned how to play the harmonium, violin, flute, and iktara, and learnt how to sing kirtan, or devotional music, which he did frequently at home and at the Sikh temple in Durham and beyond. The Dhillon's frequently hosted some of the world’s most prominent North Indian and Pakistani musicians at their home for private concerts attended by friends and local connoisseurs. Many of these concerts were memorialized in professional-quality reel-to-reel audio recordings later enjoyed again by family and friends.

The Dhillon home on Brogden Road was a hub of political activity as well. Tejpal and Parminder were determined to become American citizens as soon as they were eligible; Tejpal was the first, obtaining citizenship in 1978. The Dhillons were the among the first Indian Americans to become politically active in North Carolina. They regularly hosted fundraisers for Republican politicians in their home, including an enduring relationship with Senator Jesse Helms, who visited their home many times. Tejpal Singh encouraged his family to be politically aware, and through this example Parminder became a local Republican election monitor in the 1980s. The Dhillons attended political events regularly in the area, including the inaugurations of North Carolina’s Republican governors.

Tejpal’s inspiration for becoming a U.S. citizen actively involved in his country’s affairs was well-summarized by his quote in the Smithfield Herald on the occasion of his children’s naturalization in 1980: “Dr. Dhillon said he and the members of his family ‘cherish the freedom and human dignity that this country guarantees its citizens through the Constitution, and we relish the opportunity to have a vote in selecting our public officials.’” Tejpal’s son Mandeep was active in campus politics in high school at Ravenscroft in Raleigh and at Duke University. He joined Boys State and then went up to Washington DC as a delicate for Boys Nation during the presidentship of Mr. Ronald Reagan. His daughter, Harmeet Kaur represents California at the Republican National Committee and has twice performed the Sikh Ardaas prayer at RNC conventions in 2016 and 2024, a source of great pride to Tejpal and his family. He was always proud to watch Harmeet’s political and legal commentary on Fox News and other networks, and online over the years.

Tejpal began a lifelong passion for photography as a small boy, when he was given a box camera by an uncle. He even made his own pinhole camera. He and his brother would pose their dog in different outfits and taken photographs of their model. Throughout life he always bought the latest camera equipment and traveled around the world taking beautiful pictures of wildlife, monuments, and people from all walks of life. In the early years in student housing and residency programs, Tejpal would convert the family’s single bathroom into a photography lab from time to time, developing his own negatives and making his own prints. The Dhillon home is filled with thousands of these photographs, alongside tens of thousands of Kodachrome slides which were shown to family members and friends throughout the ‘70s and ‘80s from the Dhillon family’s many trips around the world. In later years, Tejpal took nature photographs with the latest digital equipment, including stunning safari and nature photographs.

Throughout his life, Tejpal lived according to a moral code formed by his lifelong practice of Sikhism, which instilled in him a strong sense of right and wrong, duty, charity, humility, piety, dignity, and family values. Sikhism also instills in its followers a duty to protect the less fortunate, or the weak, from evil forces. He was fortunate to marry Parminder kaur, whose family were devout Sikhs as well. Once they moved to North Carolina, the Dhillon family soon connected with other Sikhs throughout the eastern part of the state and began to take their turn in hosting Sikh religious gatherings on weekends in different homes and eventually in rented spaces. The Dhillon family and a few other community leaders were pioneers in buying land in Durham and establishing the Sikh Gurudwara of North Carolina, the first Sikh house of worship in the state, which was formally inaugurated in 1985. Over the years this house of worship has continued to be supported by all members of the Dhillon family, Tejpal Singh worshipped there, provided religious commentary and sang hymns at the Gurudwara well into his 80s.

In the 1980s, as their beloved birthplace of Punjab, the seat of the Sikh faith, became a hotbed of unrest and persecution, Tejpal become more politically engaged with Sikh issues, and renewed his interest in learning more about Sikh history and scripture. He traveled to Punjab with the family to document conditions in Punjab and made several pilgrimages over the years to the holiest site in Sikhism, Harimandir Sahib in Amristar, also known as the Golden Temple. The family regularly participated in Sikh activism and did their part to raise awareness of the Sikh plight in Punjab both internationally and with US lawmakers. Tejpal and Parminder became fully baptized Sikhs in 1983. They henceforth lived their daily lives according to the Sikh code of conduct, praying together as a family several times a day and helping to educate the next generation about Sikhism. When the Golden Temple was attacked by the Indian government in 1984, the Dhillon family were at the front lines of protests at the United Nations and outside the Indian Embassy in Washington, D.C., helping to raise awareness of the human rights violations in Punjab and beyond.

When Mandeep, after graduating from Duke, established a summer camp in Pennsylvania with land purchased by families including the Dhillons, Tejpal and Parminder became integral leaders of the Logharh Sikh Educational Foundation, which held annual Sikhi-focused camps for children and teens. The extended Dhillon family also participated in inculcating these important spiritual values in the next generations of young Sikhs. Among the attendees at these Lohgarh camps was the future Attorney General of New Jersey, Gurbir Singh Grewal, and the future Mayor of Hoboken, Ravi Bhalla. Every summer for over a decade, the family came together to learn from other Sikhs and pass on their values and heritage. To this day, the Lohgarh Foundation publishes books for Sikh children on religious and cultural topics.

Tejpal Singh ran his solo orthopedics practice in Smithfield for Fifteen Years, until 1990. During that time, as the only orthopedic surgeon in the county, he treated most of the families in the county in one way or the other, leaving a lasting impression on the community. He and Parminder moved to Raleigh in 1991 and established The Dhillon Orthopedic Clinic there, a practice that grew to include several other orthopedics specialists, physical therapists, and other professionals, before he retired in early September 2001 due to a spinal issue that made it difficult to perform long surgeries.

Soon after his retirement, Dr. Dhillon devoted himself to performing volunteer medical services in underserved areas around the world, teaching advanced orthopedic techniques to medical students and physicians in remote India, Uganda, China and South Africa. His passion for nature photography got the opportunity to flourish during these far-flung charitable trips, which sometimes lasted months. During this phase of his life, Dr. Dhillon formed a regular attachment to a Guru Nanak Mission Medical and Educational Trust, that had a 250-bed hospital, a Nursing College, and a senior secondary school in Dhahan Kaleran, Punjab. He encouraged other Sikh doctors educated in Punjab with different specialties to take turns volunteering there as well, and eventually formed a charity in the U.S. to collect funds to support the charitable endeavors of the organization. This charity continues to this day.

While Dr. Dhillon was active in his Amritsar Medical and Dental Association of North America (AMDANA) alumni association, which met annually, he felt it was also important for Sikh medical and dental professionals from India and those growing up in the US, to have a professional association in America. He conceived of this group in 1985, and he wrote to all the Sikh medical and dental professionals he knew in the United States. With the encouragement of a handful of Sikh friends, he founded the North American Sikh Medical and Dental Association in 1991. The initial meeting held only half a dozen or so families, but it has grown to hundreds every year. He was very proud of this organization and devoted many hours annually to contacting and inviting Sikh medical and dental professionals throughout the United States and looked forward to these annual gatherings with great anticipation as an opportunity to grow fellowship among Sikh medical professionals and their families while forming social and spiritual bonds as well.

Tejpal Singh Dhillon was indisputably a leader in the broader Sikh diaspora, as well as a caring and beloved physician serving not only the North Carolina, but also world community, for four decades. He dispensed care and advice freely, and many strangers who met him in the gurdwara came to consider him as surrogate father, uncle, or brother. The family has been touched by the international outpouring of support and memories in the wake of his passing. But his family also knew his private side as an exemplary son, son-in-law, father, grandfather, and husband. Tejpal Singh Dhillon was a loving and devoted son to his parents, who passed away too soon in his youth. He was equally devoted to his mother and father-in-law, both of whom lived most of their late years with the Dhillon family, and Parminder’s sister’s family in nearby Asheboro, North Carolina. He was a loving father-in-law to Parveen Dhillon, Mandeep’s wife, and welcomed Harmeet’s husband Sarvjit Randhawa into the family as well. He gave his three grandchildren – Tegh Zoraver Singh, Hazuri Kaur, and Nivaaz Kaur Dhillon – all the love and attention possible. And there could not have been a more loving and supportive husband than Tejpal Dhillon, who supported Parminder’s desire to obtain a business administration degree in Johnston County and who worked side by side with him running his medical practice for decades, retiring with him and traveling the world by his side.

Tejpal was diagnosed with heart disease in 1992 and underwent a triple bypass procedure to extend his life. As the years went on, he changed from the strenuous sport of tennis to golf and spent many happy hours staying fit walking his clubs around the golf course in Briar Creek and playing by himself or with friends. He also stayed fit jogging on a treadmill at home and was always very disciplined about his food and fitness. As he got older, he eventually required further heart treatments and a pacemaker. Tejpal greeted these health challenges with equanimity, telling friends and family that he considered these later years of life his “bonus years,” and enjoyed them all the more. In 2021, he got the news that his breathing issues were caused by idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, also known as interstitial lung disease, a progressive and incurable disease whose cause is not known. He was given months to live, and his doctors proposed minimum treatments. Through sheer force of will and discipline, Tejpal Singh forced himself to exercise every day, relying on a walker and sometimes even oxygen to get through his routine. Instead of months, he lived more than three years after the diagnosis, even as his challenges mounted and it became more and more difficult to travel and attend conferences. Tejpal embodied the Sikh principle of “Chardi kala” or rising spirits despite adversity, and when he could no longer play golf or take photographs in exotic locations, he took up artwork that he could do in the home, spending hours doing pencil drawings and paintings in his study in Raleigh. He refused to be defined or limited by his disease and remained cheerful and positive until the end. Tejpal and Parminder adopted his final canine companions, Bernadoodles Bijli and Tufaan Dhillon (brother and sister) in 2022. These two puppies brought endless delight and activity to the Dhillon home, and Tejpal loved to feed the dogs ice cream and other treats and allowed them to sit on him and get his attention and love.

During his final hospitalization, when it became clear that there were no more treatments to try and limited time to live, Tejpal’s final thoughts and acts were for others and not himself. He took time to say his final words of comfort and wisdom to all of his close family members, including the two dogs, who had their final bites of ice cream and kibbles from his hands in the cardiac ICU at Rex Hospital. After a family Ardaas prayer in his hospital room, and Tejpal’s own “jakara” or salute at the end of the prayer, Tejpal said goodbye to his family, closed his eyes, and breathed his last breath on September 20, 2024.

Tejpal Singh Dhillon was a beloved husband, father, father-in-law, grandfather, brother, and member of the greater community. He is survived by his wife, Parminder Kaur; daughter, Harmeet Kaur; son, Mandeep Singh, his daughter-in-law, Parveen Kaur, their children Tegh Zoraver Singh, Hazuri Kaur and Nivaaz Kaur; brother, Harpal Singh, and an extended family. He was the pillar of the Sikh community in North Carolina and beyond, and his legacy of public service and philanthropy reaches around the globe

A Celebration of Life will be held on Saturday, September 28th at 10:30 am at the Sikh Gurudwara of North Carolina (SGNC), 3214 E, Banner St, Durham, NC 27704. The program will be followed by Langar.

Service arrangements provided by Brown-Wynne Funeral Home & Crematory, 300 Saint Mary's Street, Raleigh, NC 27605.