Baba Atal Rai was a son of Guru Hargobind Sahib Ji who died at nine. The account is that he restored a dead playmate to life, that his father told him a life could not be given for a life without giving one's own, and that he lay down and died.
The tower of Baba Atal at Amritsar, nine storeys for the nine years, stands beside the Golden Temple complex and is the tallest structure in it.
Its interior walls carry painted scenes from the life of Guru Nanak Dev Ji, and it is one of the more significant surviving bodies of Sikh mural painting.
A boy of nine has the tallest building at the Golden Temple and the story attached to it is a warning against the display of power.
The tower was built over his cremation site and was raised in stages over the following centuries.
The tower has nine storeys, one for each year of his life, and it is the tallest structure in the complex.
The tower stands a little apart from the sarovar, joined to the complex by a walkway, and a langar runs at its foot through the day.
Its walls carry frescoes of scenes from the janamsakhis, among the oldest surviving Sikh wall painting, and their condition has been a long standing concern.