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Sikh Empire

April 20, 2023

Not to be confused with Kingdom of Sikkim.

The Sikh Empire was a state originating in the Indian subcontinent, formed under the leadership of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, who established an empire based in the Punjab.[8] The empire existed from 1799, when Maharaja Ranjit Singh captured Lahore, to 1849, when it was defeated and conquered in the Second Anglo-Sikh War. It was forged on the foundations of the Khalsa from a collection of autonomous Sikh Misl.[1][9] At its peak in the 19th century, the Empire extended from Gilgit and Tibet in the north to the deserts of Sindh in the south and from the Khyber Pass in the west to the Sutlej in the east as far as Oudh.[10][11] It was divided into four provinces: Lahore, in Punjab, which became the Sikh capital; Multan, also in Punjab; Peshawar; and Kashmir from 1799 to 1849. Religiously diverse, with an estimated population of 4.5 million in 1831 (making it the 19th most populous country at the time),[12] it was the last major region of the Indian subcontinent to be annexed by the British Empire.

Sikh Empire
سرکار خالصه
Sarkār-i-Khālsa
ਖ਼ਾਲਸਾ ਰਾਜ
Khālasā Rāj
1799–1849
Flag
Motto: ਅਕਾਲ ਸਹਾਇ
Akāl Sahāi
"With God's Grace"
Anthem: ਦੇਗ ਤੇਗ ਫ਼ਤਿਹ
Dēġ Tēġ Fatih
"Victory to Charity and Arms"
Sikh Empire at the death of Ranjit Singh in 1839
Capital
Court languagePersian[1][2][3]
Spoken languages
Religion
GovernmentFederal monarchy
Maharaja 
• 1801–1839
Ranjit Singh
• 1839
Kharak Singh
• 1839–1840
Nau Nihal Singh
• 1841–1843
Sher Singh
• 1843–1849
Duleep Singh
Regent 
• 1840–1841
Chand Kaur
• 1843–1846
Jind Kaur
Wazir 
• 1799–1818
Jamadar Khushal Singh[4]
• 1818–1843
Dhian Singh Dogra
• 1843–1844
Hira Singh Dogra
• 14 May – 21 September 1845
Jawahar Singh Aulakh
• 1845–1846
Lal Singh
• 31 January – 9 March 1846
Gulab Singh[5]
Historical eraEarly modern period
• Capture of Lahore by Ranjit Singh
7 July 1799
29 March 1849
Area
1839[6]520,000 km2 (200,000 sq mi)
Population
• 1800s
12,000,000[7]
CurrencyNanak Shahi Sikke
Today part of

The foundations of the Sikh Empire can be traced to as early as 1707, the year of Aurangzeb's death and the start of the downfall of the Mughal Empire. With the Mughals significantly weakened, the Sikh army, known as the Dal Khalsa, a rearrangement of the Khalsa inaugurated by Guru Gobind Singh, led expeditions against them and the Afghans in the west. This led to a growth of the army which split into different confederacies or semi-independent misls. Each of these component armies controlled different areas and cities. However, in the period from 1762 to 1799, Sikh commanders of the misls appeared to be coming into their own as independent.

The formation of the empire began with the capture of Lahore, by Ranjit Singh, from its Afghan ruler, Zaman Shah Durrani, and the subsequent and progressive expulsion of Afghans from the Punjab, by capitalizing off Afghan decline in the Afghan-Sikh Wars, and the unification of the separate Sikh misls. Ranjit Singh was proclaimed as Maharaja of the Punjab on 12 April 1801 (to coincide with Vaisakhi), creating a unified political state. Sahib Singh Bedi, a descendant of Guru Nanak, conducted the coronation.[13] Ranjit Singh rose to power in a very short period, from a leader of a single misl to finally becoming the Maharaja of Punjab. He began to modernise his army, using the latest training as well as weapons and artillery. After the death of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, the empire was weakened by the British East India Company stoking internal divisions and political mismanagement. Finally, by 1849 the state was dissolved after the defeat in the Second Anglo-Sikh War.

Background

Mughal rule of Punjab

The Sikh religion began around the time of the conquest of the Northern Indian subcontinent by Babur, the founder of the Mughal Empire. His conquering grandson, Mughal Emperor Akbar, supported religious freedom and after visiting the langar of Guru Amar Das got a favourable impression of Sikhism. As a result of his visit, he donated land to the langar and the Mughals did not have any conflict with Sikh gurus until his death in 1605.[14]

His successor Jahangir, saw the Sikhs as a political threat. He ordered Guru Arjun Dev, who had been arrested for supporting the rebellious Khusrau Mirza,[15] to change the passage about Islam in the Adi Granth. When the Guru refused, Jahangir ordered him to be put to death by torture.[16] Guru Arjan Dev's martyrdom led to the sixth Guru, Guru Hargobind, declaring Sikh sovereignty in the creation of the Akal Takht and the establishment of a fort to defend Amritsar.[17]

Jahangir attempted to assert authority over the Sikhs by jailing Guru Hargobind at Gwalior, but released him after a number of years when he no longer felt threatened. The Sikh community did not have any further issues with the Mughal empire until the death of Jahangir in 1627. The succeeding son of Jahangir, Shah Jahan, took offence at Guru Hargobind's "sovereignty" and after a series of assaults on Amritsar forced the Sikhs to retreat to the Sivalik Hills.[17]

The next guru, Guru Har Rai, maintained the guruship in these hills by defeating local attempts to seize Sikh land and playing a neutral role in the power struggle between two of the sons of Shah Jahan, Aurangzeb and Dara Shikoh, for control of the Mughal Empire. The ninth Guru, Guru Tegh Bahadur, moved the Sikh community to Anandpur and travelled extensively to visit and preach in defiance of Aurangzeb, who attempted to install Ram Rai as new guru. Guru Tegh Bahadur aided Kashmiri Pandits in avoiding conversion to Islam and was arrested by Aurangzeb. When offered a choice between conversion to Islam and death, he chose to die rather than compromise his principles and was executed.[18]

Formation of the Khalsa

Guru Gobind Singh assumed the guruship in 1675 and to avoid battles with Sivalik Hill rajas moved the guruship to Paunta. There he built a large fort to protect the city and garrisoned an army to protect it. The growing power of the Sikh community alarmed the Sivalik Hill rajas, who attempted to attack the city, but Guru Gobind Singh's forces routed them at the Battle of Bhangani. He moved on to Anandpur and established the Khalsa, a collective army of baptised Sikhs, on 30 March 1699.[19]

The establishment of the Khalsa united the Sikh community against various Mughal-backed claimants to the guruship.[20] In 1701, a combined army of the Sivalik Hill rajas and the Mughals under Wazir Khan attacked Anandpur. The Khalsa retreated but regrouped to defeat the Mughals at the Battle of Muktsar. In 1707, Guru Gobind Singh accepted an invitation by Aurangzeb's successor Bahadur Shah I to meet him. The meeting took place at Agra on 23 July 1707.[19]

Banda Singh Bahadur

In August 1708, Guru Gobind Singh visited Nanded. There he met a Bairāgī recluse, Madho Das, who converted to Sikhism, rechristened as Banda Singh Bahadur.[19][21] A short time before his death, Guru Gobind Singh ordered him to reconquer Punjab region and gave him a letter that commanded all Sikhs to join him. After two years of gaining supporters, Banda Singh Bahadur initiated an agrarian uprising by breaking up the large estates of Zamindar families and distributing the land to the poor peasants who farmed the land.[22]

Banda Singh Bahadur started his rebellion with the defeat of Mughal armies at Samana and Sadhaura and the rebellion culminated in the defeat of Sirhind. During the rebellion, Banda Singh Bahadur made a point of destroying the cities in which Mughals had been cruel to the supporters of Guru Gobind Singh. He executed Wazir Khan in revenge for the deaths of Guru Gobind Singh's sons and Pir Budhu Shah after the Sikh victory at Sirhind.[23]

He ruled the territory between the Sutlej river and the Yamuna river, established a capital in the Himalayas at Lohgarh and struck coinage in the names of Guru Nanak and Guru Gobind Singh.[22] In 1716, his army was defeated by the Mughals after he attempted to defend his fort at Gurdas Nangal. He was captured along with 700 of his men and sent to Delhi, where they were all tortured and executed after refusing to convert to Islam.[24]

History

Dal Khalsa period

Main article: Dal Khalsa (Sikh Empire)


Sikh Confederacy

Main article: Misl

The period from 1716 to 1799 was a highly turbulent time politically and militarily in the Punjab region. This was caused by the overall decline of the Mughal empire[25] that left a power vacuum in the region that was eventually filled by the Sikhs of the Dal Khalsa, meaning "Khalsa army" or "Khalsa party". In the late 18th century, after defeating several invasions by the Afghan rulers of the Durrani Empire and their allies,[26] remnants of the Mughals and their administrators, the Mughal-allied Hindu hill-rajas of the Sivalik Hills,[27][28] and hostile local Muslims siding with other Muslim forces.[26] The Sikhs of the Dal Khalsa eventually formed their own independent Sikh administrative regions, Misls, derived from a Perso-Arabic term meaning 'similar', headed by Misldars. These Misls were united in large part by Maharaja Ranjit Singh.

Cis-Sutlej states

The Cis-Sutlej states were a group of Sikh[29] states in the Punjab region lying between the Sutlej River to the north, the Himalayas to the east, the Yamuna River and Delhi district to the south, and Sirsa District to the west. These states fell under the suzerainty of the Maratha Empire after 1785 before the Second Anglo-Maratha War of 1803–1805, after which the Marathas lost control of the territory to the British East India Company. The Cis-Sutlej states included Kalsia, Kaithal, Patiala State, Nabha State, Jind State, Thanesar, Maler Kotla, Ludhiana, Kapurthala State, Ambala, Ferozpur and Faridkot State, among others.[30]

While these Sikh states had been set up by the Dal Khalsa, they did not become part of the Sikh Empire. There was a mutual ban on warfare following the treaty of Amritsar in 1809 (in which the empire forfeited the claim to the Cis-Sutlej States, and the British were not to interfere north of the Sutlej or in the empire's existing territory south of the Sutlej),[31] following attempts by Ranjit Singh to wrest control of these states from the British between 1806 and 1809[32][33]

The Sikh crossing of the Sutlej, following British militarization of the border with Punjab (from 2,500 men and six guns in 1838 to 17,612 men and 66 guns in 1844, and 40,523 men and 94 guns in 1845), and plans on using the newly conquered territory of Sindh as a springboard to advance on the Sikh-held region of Multan,[34] eventually resulted in conflict with the British.

Intra-Misl Wars

After the reign of Jassa Singh Ramgarhia, the Sikh Misls became divided and fought each other. A sort of 'Cold War' broke out with the Bhangi, Nakkai, Dalelwala and Ramgharia Misls verses Sukerchakia, Ahluwalia, Karor Singhia and Kaniyeha. The Shaheedan, Nishania and Singhpuria also allied but did not engage in warfare with the others and continued the Dal Khalsa.

The Phulkian Misl was excommunicated from the confederacy. Rani Sada Kaur of the Kanhaiya Misl rose in the vacuum and destroyed the power of the Bhangis. She later gave her throne to Maharaja Ranjit Singh.

Empire

 
The expanding empire in 1809. The Cis-Sutlej states are visible south of the Sutlej river

The formal start of the Sikh Empire began with the unification of the Misls by 1801, creating a unified political state. All the Misl leaders, who were affiliated with the army, were the nobility with usually long and prestigious family backgrounds in Sikh history.[1]

The main geographical footprint of the empire was from the Punjab region to Khyber Pass in the west, to Kashmir in the north, Sindh in the south, and Tibet in the east.[35]

In 1799 Ranjit Singh moved the capital to Lahore from Gujranwala, where it had been established in 1763 by his grandfather, Charat Singh.[36]

 
Ranjit Singh holding court in 1838

Hari Singh Nalwa was Commander-in-Chief of the Sikh Khalsa Army from 1825 to 1837.[37] He is known for his role in the conquests of Kasur, Sialkot, Multan, Kashmir, Attock and Peshawar. Nalwa led the Sikh army in freeing Shah Shuja from Kashmir and secured the Koh-i-Nor diamond for Maharaja Ranjit Singh. He served as governor of Kashmir and Hazara and established a mint on behalf of the Sikh empire to facilitate revenue collection. His frontier policy of holding the Khyber Pass was later used by the British Raj. Nalwa was responsible for expanding the frontier of Sikh empire to the Indus River. At the time of his death, the western boundary of the Sikh Empire was the Khyber Pass.

Geography

 
Indian subcontinent in 1805.

The Sikh Empire spanned a total of over 200,000 sq mi (520,000 km2) at its zenith.[38][39][40] Another more conservative estimate puts its total surface area during its zenith at 100,436 sq mi (260,124 km sq).[41]

The following modern-day political divisions made up the historical Sikh Empire:

Jamrud District (Khyber Agency, Pakistan) was the westernmost limit of the Sikh Empire. The westward expansion was stopped in the Battle of Jamrud, in which the Afghans managed to kill the prominent Sikh general Hari Singh Nalwa in an offensive, though the Sikhs successfully held their position at their Jamrud fort. Ranjit Singh sent his General Sirdar Bahadur Gulab Singh Powind thereafter as reinforcement and he crushed the Pashtun rebellion harshly.[51] In 1838, Ranjit Singh with his troops marched into Kabul to take part in the victory parade along with the British after restoring Shah Shoja to the Afghan throne at Kabul.[52]

Religious policy

 
Nanakshahi coins of Sikh empire

The Sikh Empire was idiosyncratic in that it allowed men from religions other than their own to rise to commanding positions of authority.[53]

The Fakir brothers were trusted personal advisors and assistants as well as close friends to Ranjit Singh,[54] particularly Fakir Azizuddin, who would serve in the positions of foreign minister of the empire and translator for the maharaja, and played important roles in such important events as the negotiations with the British, during which he convinced Ranjit Singh to maintain diplomatic ties with the British and not to go to war with them in 1808, as British troops were moved along the Sutlej in pursuance of the British policy of confining Ranjit Singh to the north of the river, and setting the Sutlej as the dividing boundary between the Sikh and British empires;[55] negotiating with Dost Muhammad Khan during his unsuccessful attempt to retake Peshawar,[55] and ensuring the succession of the throne during the Maharaja's last days in addition to caretaking after a stroke, as well as occasional military assignments throughout his career.[56] The Fakir brothers were introduced to the Maharaja when their father, Ghulam Muhiuddin, a physician, was summoned by him to treat an eye ailment soon after his capture of Lahore.[57]

The other Fakir brothers were Imamuddin, one of his principal administration officers, and Nuruddin, who served as home minister and personal physician, were also granted jagirs by the Maharaja.[58]

Every year, while at Amritsar, Ranjit Singh visited shrines of holy people of other faiths, including several Muslim saints, which did not offend even the most religious Sikhs of his administration.[59] As relayed by Fakir Nuruddin, orders were issued to treat people of all faith groups, occupations,[60] and social levels equally and in accordance with the doctrines of their faith, per the Shastras and the Quran, as well as local authorities like judges and panches (local elder councils),[61] as well as banning forcible possession of others' land or of inhabited houses to be demolished.[62] There were special courts for Muslims which ruled in accordance to Muslim law in personal matters,[63] and common courts preceded over by judicial officers which administered justice under the customary law of the districts and socio-ethnic groups, and were open to all who wanted to be governed by customary religious law, whether Hindu, Sikh, or Muslim.[63]

One of Ranjit Singh's first acts after the 1799 capture of Lahore was to revive the offices of the hereditary Qazis and Muftis which had been prevalent in Mughal times.[63] Kazi Nizamuddin was appointed to decide marital issues among Muslims, while Muftis Mohammad Shahpuri and Sadulla Chishti were entrusted with powers to draw up title-deeds relating to transfers of immovable property.[63] The old mohalladari[definition needed] system was reintroduced with each mahallah, or neighborhood subdivision, placed under the charge of one of its members. The office of Kotwal, or prefect of police, was conferred upon a Muslim, Imam Bakhsh.[63]

Generals were also drawn from a variety of communities, along with prominent Sikh generals like Hari Singh Nalwa, Fateh Singh Dullewalia, Nihal Singh Atariwala, Chattar Singh Attariwalla, and Fateh Singh Kalianwala; Hindu generals included Misr Diwan Chand and Dewan Mokham Chand Nayyar, his son, and his grandson; and Muslim generals included Ilahi Bakhsh and Mian Ghaus Khan; one general, Balbhadra Kunwar, was a Nepalese Gurkha, and European generals included Jean-Francois Allard, Jean-Baptiste Ventura, and Paolo Avitabile.[64] other notable generals of the Sikh Khalsa Army were Veer Singh Dhillon, Sham Singh Attariwala, Mahan Singh Mirpuri, and Zorawar Singh Kahluria, among others.

The appointment of key posts in public offices was based on merit and loyalty, regardless of the social group or religion of the appointees, both in and around the court, and in higher as well as lower posts. Key posts in the civil and military administration were held by members of communities from all over the empire and beyond, including Sikhs, Muslims, Khatris, Brahmins, Dogras, Rajputs, Pashtuns, Europeans, and Americans, among others,[65] and worked their way up the hierarchy to attain merit. Dhian Singh, the prime minister, was a Dogra, whose brothers Gulab Singh and Suchet Singh served in the high-ranking administrative and military posts, respectively.[65] Brahmins like finance minister Raja Dina Nath, Sahib Dyal, and others also served in financial capacities.[64]

Muslims in prominent positions included the Fakir brothers, Kazi Nizamuddin, and Mufti Muhammad Shah, among others. Among the top-ranking Muslim officers there were two ministers, one governor and several district officers; there were 41 high-ranking Muslim officers in the army, including two generals and several colonels,[64] and 92 Muslims were senior officers in the police, judiciary, legal department and supply and store departments.[64] In artillery, Muslims represented over 50% of the numbers while the cavalry had some 10% Muslims from among the troopers.[66]

Thus, the government was run by an elite corps drawn from many communities, giving the empire the character of a secular system of government, even when built on theocratic foundations.[67]

A ban on cow slaughter, which can be related to Hindu sentiments, was universally imposed in the Sarkar Khalsaji.[68][69] Ranjit Singh also donated large amounts of gold for the plating of the Kashi Vishwanath Temple's dome.[70][71]

The Sikhs attempted not to offend the prejudices of Muslims, noted Baron von Hügel, the Austrian botanist and explorer,[72] yet the Sikhs were described as harsh. In this regard, Masson's explanation is perhaps the most pertinent: "Though compared to the Afghans, the Sikhs were mild and exerted a protecting influence, yet no advantages could compensate to their Mohammedan subjects, the idea of subjection to infidels, and the prohibition to slay kine, and to repeat the azan, or 'summons to prayer'."[73] Chitralekha Zutshi and William Roe Polk write that Sikh governors adopted policies that alienated the Muslim population such as the ban on cow slaughter and the azan (the Islamic call to prayer), the seizure of mosques as property of the state, and imposed ruinous taxes on Kashmiri Muslims causing a famine in 1832. In addition, begar (forced labour) was imposed by the Sikh administration to facilitate the supply of materials to the imperial army, a policy that was augmented by the successive Dogra rulers.[74][75][76]

These policies led the Kashmiri Muslim population to emirgate en masse to more lenient neighboring countries, particularly Ladakh.[77] As a symbolic assertion of power, the Sikhs regularly desecrated Muslim places of worship, including closing of the Jamia Masjid in Srinagar and the conversion of the Badshahi Mosque in Lahore to an ammunition store and horse stable, but the empire still maintained Persian administrative institutions and court etiquette; the Sikh silver rupees were minted on the Mughal standard with Persian legends.[78][79]

In 1839, a major pogrom, called the Allahdad, targeting the local Jews of Mashhad in Qajar Persia had occurred. A group of Persian Jewish refugees from Mashhad, escaping persecution back home in Qajar Persia, were granted rights to settle in the Sikh Empire around the year 1839. Most of the Jewish families settled in Rawalpindi (specifically in the Babu Mohallah neighbourhood) and Peshawar.[80][81][82][83] Most of these Jews would leave for India during the partition of 1947.[84]

Christian missionaries had been active in the Punjab even prior to the dissolution of the empire in 1849.[85]

Administration

 
Detail from ‘Darbar (royal court) of Maharaja Ranjit Singh’, gouache, ca.1850

The empire was divided into various provinces (known as Subas), them namely being:[41]

No. Name Estimated population (1838) Major population centre
1. Lahore Suba 1,900,000 Lahore
2. Multan Suba 750,000 Multan
3. Peshawar Suba 550,000 Peshawar
4. Derajat Suba 600,000 Dera Ghazi Khan, Dera Ismail Khan
5. Jammu and Hill States Suba 1,100,000 Srinagar

Demography

Religions in Khalsa Empire (1800s)[7][86]: 2694 
Religions Percent
Islam
 
 69%
Hinduism
 
 24%
Sikhism
 
 6%
others
 
 1%

The population of the Sikh empire during the time of Ranjit Singh’s rule was estimated to be around 12 million people.[7] There were 8.4 million Muslims, 2.88 million Hindus and 7.22 Lakhs Sikhs.[86]

The religious demography of the empire is estimated to have been just over 10%[87] to 12%[88] Sikh, 80% Muslim,[87] and just under 10% Hindu.[87] Surjit Hans gave different numbers by retrospectively projecting the 1881 census, putting Muslims at 51%, Hindus at 40% and Sikhs at around 8%, the remaining 1% being Europeans.[89] The population was 3.5 million in 1831, according to Amarinder Singh's The Last Sunset: The Rise and Fall of the Lahore Durbar.[90] Hans Herrli in The Coins of the Sikhs estimated the total population of the empire to be around 5.35 million during 1838.[41]

An estimated 90% of the Sikh population at the time, and more than half of the total population, was concentrated in the upper Bari Doabs, Jalandhar, and upper Rechna Doabs, and in the areas of their greatest concentration formed about one third of the population in the 1830s; half of the Sikh population of this core region was in the area covered by the later districts of Lahore and Amritsar.[91]

Revenue

Revenue in Rupees, 1844[92]
Sr Particulars Revenue in Rupees
1 Land Revenue
1.a Tributary States 5,65,000
1.b Farms 1,79,85,000
1.c Eleemosynary 20,00,000
1.d Jaghirs 95,25,000
2 Customs 24,00,000
Total 3,24,75,000

Decline

 
Two late 19th century drawings of Sikh troops in action against British forces during the Anglo-Sikh Wars
 
The Samadhi of Ranjit Singh is located in Lahore, Pakistan, adjacent to the iconic Badshahi Mosque

After Ranjit Singh's death in 1839, the empire was severely weakened by internal divisions and political mismanagement. This opportunity was used by the British East India Company to launch the First Anglo-Sikh War.

The Battle of Ferozeshah in 1845 marked many turning points, the British encountered the Punjab Army, opening with a gun-duel in which the Sikhs "had the better of the British artillery". As the British made advances, Europeans in their army were specially targeted, as the Sikhs believed if the army "became demoralized, the backbone of the enemy's position would be broken".[93] The fighting continued throughout the night. The British position "grew graver as the night wore on", and "suffered terrible casualties with every single member of the Governor General's staff either killed or wounded".[94] Nevertheless, the British army took and held Ferozeshah. British General Sir James Hope Grant recorded: "Truly the night was one of gloom and forbidding and perhaps never in the annals of warfare has a British Army on such a large scale been nearer to a defeat which would have involved annihilation."[94]

The reasons for the withdrawal of the Sikhs from Ferozeshah are contentious. Some believe that it was treachery of the non-Sikh high command of their own army which led to them marching away from a British force in a precarious and battered state. Others believe that a tactical withdrawal was the best policy.[citation needed]

The Sikh empire was finally dissolved at the end of the Second Anglo-Sikh War in 1849 into separate princely states and the British province of Punjab. Eventually, a Lieutenant Governorship was formed in Lahore as a direct representative of the British Crown.

Timeline

List of rulers

S. No. Name Portrait Birth and death Reign Note
1 Maharaja Ranjit Singh   13 November 1780 (Gujranwala) 27 June 1839 (Lahore) 12 April 1801 27 June 1839 38 years, 76 days The first Sikh ruler Stroke
2 Maharaja Kharak Singh   22 February 1801 (Lahore) 5 November 1840 (Lahore) 27 June 1839 8 October 1839 103 days Son of Ranjit Singh Poisoning
3 Maharaja Nau Nihal Singh   11 February 1820 (Lahore) 6 November 1840 (Lahore) 8 October 1839 6 November 1840 1 year, 29 days Son of Kharak Singh Assassinated
4 Maharani Chand Kaur
  1802 (Fatehgarh Churian) 11 June 1842 (Lahore) 6 November 1840 18 January 1841 73 days Wife of Kharak Singh and the only female ruler of Sikh Empire Abdicated
5 Maharaja Sher Singh   4 December 1807 (Batala) 15 September 1843 (Lahore) 18 January 1841 15 September 1843 2 years, 240 days Son of Ranjit Singh Assassinated
6 Maharaja Duleep Singh   6 September 1838 (Lahore) 22 October 1893 (Paris) 15 September 1843 29 March 1849 5 years, 195 days Son of Ranjit Singh Exiled
7 Maharani Jind Kaur
(regent)(nominal) 		  1817 (Gujranwala) 1 August 1863 (Kensington) 15 September 1843 29 March 1849 5 years, 195 days Wife of Ranjit Singh Exiled

Gallery

  •  

    Ranjit Singh, c. 1830.[95]

  •  
    Ranjit Singh listening to Guru Granth Sahib being recited near the Akal Takht and Golden Temple, Amritsar, Punjab, India.
  •  

    Sikh warrior helmet with butted mail neckguard, 1820–1840, iron overlaid with gold with mail neckguard of iron and brass

  •  

    A letter sent from the King of France, Louis-Philippe to Maharaja Ranjit Singh. Ranjit Singh is addressed as “Rendjit Sing Bahador - Padichah du Pendjab”. Dated 27 October, 1835

Preceded by Sikh Empire
1799–1849 		Succeeded by

See also

References

Citations

  1. ^ a b c Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Ranjit Singh" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 22 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 892.
  2. ^ Grewal, J. S. (1990). The Sikhs of the Punjab, Chapter 6: The Sikh empire (1799–1849). The New Cambridge History of India. Cambridge University Press. p. 112. ISBN 0-521-63764-3. The continuance of Persian as the language of administration.
  3. ^ Fenech, Louis E. (2013). The Sikh Zafar-namah of Guru Gobind Singh: A Discursive Blade in the Heart of the Mughal Empire. Oxford University Press (USA). p. 239. ISBN 978-0199931453. We see such acquaintance clearly within the Sikh court of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, for example, the principal language of which was Persian.
  4. ^ Grewal, J.S. (1990). The Sikhs of the Punjab. Cambridge University Press. p. 107. ISBN 0-521-63764-3. Retrieved 15 April 2014.
  5. ^ Satinder Singh, Raja Gulab Singh's Role 1971, pp. 46–50.
  6. ^ Singh, Amarpal (15 August 2010). The First Anglo-Sikh War. Amberley Publishing Limited. ISBN 978-1-4456-2038-1. By 1839, the year of his death, the Sikh kingdom extended from Tibet and Kashmir to Sind and from the Khyber Pass to the Himalayas in the east. It spanned 600 miles from east to west and 350 miles from north to south, comprising an area of just over 200,000 square miles.
  7. ^ a b c Singh, Pashaura (2016). "Sikh Empire". The Encyclopedia of Empire. pp. 1–6. doi:10.1002/9781118455074.wbeoe314. ISBN 9781118455074.
  8. ^ "Ranjit Singh: A Secular Sikh Sovereign by K.S. Duggal. (Date:1989. ISBN 8170172446)". Exoticindiaart.com. 3 September 2015. Retrieved 9 August 2009.
  9. ^ Grewal, J. S. (1990). The Sikhs of the Punjab, Chapter 6: The Sikh empire (1799–1849). The New Cambridge History of India. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-63764-3.
  10. ^ Gupta, Hari Ram (1991). History of the Sikhs. Munshiram Manoharlal. p. 201. ISBN 9788121505154.
  11. ^ Singh, Khushwant (2004). History of the Sikhs. ‎ Oxford University Press. pp. viii. ISBN 9780195673081.
  12. ^ Amarinder Singh's The Last Sunset: The Rise and Fall of the Lahore Durbar
  13. ^ The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism 8 May 2014 at the Wayback Machine, section Sāhib Siṅgh Bedī, Bābā (1756–1834).
  14. ^ Kalsi 2005, pp. 106–107
  15. ^ Markovits 2004, p. 98
  16. ^ Melton, J. Gordon (15 January 2014). Faiths Across Time: 5,000 Years of Religious History. ABC-CLIO. p. 1163. ISBN 9781610690263. Retrieved 3 November 2014.
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  29. ^ Jayanta Kumar Ray (2007). Aspects of India's International Relations, 1700 to 2000: South Asia and the World. Pearson Education. p. 379. ISBN 9788131708347.
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  31. ^ Lt. Gen. Kirpal Singh Randhawa, PVSM, AVSM (Retd.). "Sikh Wars". www.sikh-heritage.co.uk. Retrieved 13 April 2019.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  32. ^ Jayanta Kumar Ray (2007). Aspects of India's International Relations, 1700 to 2000: South Asia and the World. Pearson Education. pp. 379–380. ISBN 9788131708347.
  33. ^ Sangat Singh, the Sikhs in History.
  34. ^ Jayanta Kumar Ray (2007). Aspects of India's International Relations, 1700 to 2000: South Asia and the World. Pearson Education. p. 381. ISBN 9788131708347.
  35. ^ Gupta, Hari Ram (1991). History of the Sikhs. Munshiram Manoharlal. ISBN 9788121505154.
  36. ^ World and Its Peoples: Middle East, Western Asia, and Northern Africa. Marshall Cavendish. 2007. p. 411. ISBN 9780761475712.
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  38. ^ Manning, Stephen (30 September 2020). Bayonet to Barrage Weaponry on the Victorian Battlefield. Pen & Sword Books Limited. ISBN 9781526777249. The Sikh kingdom expanded from Tibet in the east to Kashmir in the west and from Sind in the south to the Khyber Pass in the north, an area of 200,000 square miles
  39. ^ Barczewski, Stephanie (22 March 2016). Heroic Failure and the British. Yale University Press. p. 89. ISBN 9780300186819. ..the Sikh state encompassed over 200,000 square miles (518,000 sq km)
  40. ^ Khilani, N. M. (1972). British power in the Punjab, 1839-1858. Asia Publishing House. p. 251. ISBN 9780210271872. ..into existence a kingdom of the Punjab of over 200,000 square miles
  41. ^ a b c Herrli, Hans (1993). The Coins of the Sikhs. p. 10.
  42. ^ The Masters Revealed, (Johnson, p. 128)
  43. ^ Britain and Tibet 1765–1947, (Marshall, p.116)
  44. ^ Pandey, Dr. Hemant Kumar; Singh, Manish Raj (2017). India's Major Military and Rescue Operations. Horizon Books. p. 57. ISBN 9789386369390.
  45. ^ Deng, Jonathan M. (2010). "Frontier: The Making of the Northern and Eastern Border in Ladakh From 1834 to the Present". SIT Digital Collections Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection. 920.
  46. ^ The Khyber Pass: A History of Empire and Invasion, (Docherty, p. 187)
  47. ^ The Khyber Pass: A History of Empire and Invasion, (Docherty, pp. 185–187)
  48. ^ Bennett-Jones, Owen; Singh, Sarina, Pakistan & the Karakoram Highway Page 199
  49. ^ Waheeduddin 1981, p. vii.
  50. ^ Kartar Singh Duggal (2001). Maharaja Ranjit Singh, the Last to Lay Arms. Abhinav Publications. p. 131. ISBN 9788170174103.
  51. ^ Hastings Donnan, Marriage Among Muslims: Preference and Choice in Northern Pakistan, (Brill, 1997), 41.[1]
  52. ^ Encyclopædia Britannica – Ranjit Singh
  53. ^ Kartar Singh Duggal (1 January 2001). Maharaja Ranjit Singh: The Last to Lay Arms. Abhinav Publications. pp. 125–126. ISBN 978-81-7017-410-3.
  54. ^ Waheeduddin 1981, p. ix.
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  56. ^ Waheeduddin 1981, p. 28.
  57. ^ Waheeduddin 1981, p. 25.
  58. ^ Waheeduddin 1981, p. iv.
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  67. ^ Waheeduddin 1981, p. 24.
  68. ^ Lodrick, D. O. 1981. Sacred Cows, Sacred Places. Berkeley: University of California Press, p. 145
  69. ^ Vigne, G. T., 1840. A Personal Narrative of a Visit to Ghuzni, Kabul, and Afghanistan, and a Residence at the Court of Dost Mohammed, London: Whittaker and Co. p. 246 The Real Ranjit Singh; by Fakir Syed Waheeduddin, published by Punjabi University, ISBN 81-7380-778-7, 1 January 2001, 2nd ed.
  70. ^ Matthew Atmore Sherring (1868). The Sacred City of the Hindus: An Account of Benares in Ancient and Modern Times. Trübner & co. p. 51.
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  75. ^ Polk, William Roe (January 2018). Crusade and Jihad: The Thousand-year War Between the Muslim World and the Global North. Yale University Press. p. 263. ISBN 9780300222906.
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  77. ^ Dollfus, Pascale (1995). "The History of Muslims in Central Ladakh". The Tibet Journal. 20 (3): 41. ISSN 0970-5368. JSTOR 43300542.
  78. ^ Ziad, Waleed (16 November 2021). Hidden Caliphate: Sufi Saints Beyond the Oxus and Indus. Harvard University Press. p. 45. ISBN 978-0-674-24881-6.
  79. ^ Chida-Razvi, Mehreen (20 September 2020). The Friday Mosque in the City: Liminality, Ritual, and Politics. Intellect Books. pp. 91–94. ISBN 978-1-78938-304-1. In addition to the masjid's use as a site for military storage, stables for the cavalry horses, and barracks for soldiers, parts of it were also used as storage for powder magazines.
  80. ^ Tahir, Saif (3 March 2016). "The lost Jewish history of Rawalpindi, Pakistan". blogs.timesofisrael.com. Retrieved 27 February 2023. The history of Jews in Rawalpindi dates back to 1839 when many Jewish families from Mashhad fled to save themselves from the persecutions and settled in various parts of subcontinent including Peshawar and Rawalpindi.
  81. ^ Considine, Craig (2017). Islam, race, and pluralism in the Pakistani diaspora. Milton: Routledge. ISBN 978-1-315-46276-9. OCLC 993691884.
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  83. ^ "Rawalpindi – Rawalpindi Development Authority". Rawalpindi Development Authority (rda.gop.pk). Retrieved 27 February 2023. Jews first arrived in Rawalpindi's Babu Mohallah neighbourhood from Mashhad, Persia in 1839, in order to flee from anti-Jewish laws instituted by the Qajar dynasty.
  84. ^ Daiya, Kavita (2008). Violent belongings : partition, gender, and national culture in postcolonial India. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. p. 129. ISBN 978-1-59213-745-9. OCLC 302391286.
  85. ^ Kumar, Ram Narayan (1991). The Sikh struggle : origin, evolution, and present phase. Georg Sieberer. Delhi: Chanakya Publications. p. 100. ISBN 81-7001-083-7. OCLC 24339822.
  86. ^ a b Puri, Harish K. (June–July 2003). "Scheduled Castes in Sikh Community: A Historical Perspective". Economic and Political Weekly. Economic and Political Weekly. 38 (26): 2693–2701. JSTOR 4413731.
  87. ^ a b c Kartar Singh Duggal (2001). Maharaja Ranjit Singh, the Last to Lay Arms. Abhinav Publications. p. 55. ISBN 9788170174103.
  88. ^ J.S. Grewal (1998). The Sikhs of the Punjab, Volumes 2–3. Cambridge University Press. p. 113. ISBN 9780521637640.
  89. ^ Hans, Surjit (April 2006). "Why are we sentimental about Ranjit Singh ?". The Panjab, Past and Present. XXXVII-Part 1: 47.
  90. ^ Singh, Amarinder (2010). The Last Sunset: The Rise and Fall of the Lahore Durbar. Roli Books. p. 23. ISBN 978-81-7436-779-2.
  91. ^ J. S. Grewal (1998). The Sikhs of the Punjab, Volumes 2–3. Cambridge University Press. p. 113. ISBN 9780521637640.
  92. ^ Cunningham, Joseph Davey (1849). A History of the Sikhs, from the Origin of the Nation to the Battles of the Sutlej. London: J. Murray. p. 424.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link)
  93. ^ Ranjit Singh: administration and British policy, (Prakash, p.31-33)
  94. ^ a b Maharaja Ranjit Singh, the last to lay arms, (Duggal, p.136-137)
  95. ^ Miniature painting from the photo album of princely families in the Sikh and Rajput territories by Colonel James Skinner (1778–1841)

Sources

  • Heath, Ian (2005), The Sikh Army 1799–1849, Osprey Publishing (UK), ISBN 1-84176-777-8
  • Kalsi, Sewa Singh (2005), Sikhism, Religions of the World, Chelsea House Publications, ISBN 978-0-7910-8098-6
  • Markovits, Claude (2004), A history of modern India, 1480-1950, London, England: Anthem Press, ISBN 978-1-84331-152-2
  • Jestice, Phyllis G. (2004), Holy people of the world: a cross-cultural encyclopedia, Volume 3, ABC-CLIO, ISBN 978-1-57607-355-1
  • Johar, Surinder Singh (1975), Guru Tegh Bahadur, University of Wisconsin—Madison Center for South Asian Studies, ISBN 81-7017-030-3
  • Singh, Pritam (2008), Federalism, Nationalism and Development: India and the Punjab Economy, Routledge, pp. 25–26, ISBN 978-0-415-45666-1
  • Nesbitt, Eleanor (2005), Sikhism: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, USA, p. 61, ISBN 978-0-19-280601-7
  • Waheeduddin, Fakir Syed (1981). The Real Ranjit Singh (1st ed.). Patiala, Punjab, India: Punjabi University. ISBN 978-8173807787. Retrieved 14 May 2019.
  • Grewal, J. S. (1998). The Sikhs of the Punjab (The New Cambridge History of India II.3) (Revised ed.). Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press. pp. 82–127. ISBN 9781316025338. Retrieved 16 April 2020.

Further reading

  • Volume 2: Evolution of Sikh Confederacies (1708–1769), By Hari Ram Gupta. (Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers. Date: 1999, ISBN 81-215-0540-2, 383 pages, illustrated).
  • The Sikh Army (1799–1849) (Men-at-arms), By Ian Heath. (Date: 2005, ISBN 1-84176-777-8).
  • The Heritage of the Sikhs By Harbans Singh. (Date: 1994, ISBN 81-7304-064-8).
  • Sikh Domination of the Mughal Empire. (Date: 2000, Second Edition. ISBN 81-215-0213-6).
  • The Sikh Commonwealth or Rise and Fall of Sikh Misls. (Date: 2001, revised edition. ISBN 81-215-0165-2).
  • Maharaja Ranjit Singh, Lord of the Five Rivers, By Jean-Marie Lafont. (Oxford University Press. Date: 2002, ISBN 0-19-566111-7).
  • History of Panjab, By Dr L. M. Joshi and Dr Fauja Singh.
  • Maharaja Ranjit Singh and his Times, By Bhagat Singh. (Sehgal Publishers Service. Date: 1990, ISBN 81-85477-01-9).
  • Ranjit Singh—monarch mystique, By V. Nalwa. (Hari Singh Nalwa Foundation Trust. Date: 2022, ISBN 978-81-910526-1-9).

External links

 
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April 20, 2023
sikh, empire, confused, with, kingdom, sikkim, state, originating, indian, subcontinent, formed, under, leadership, maharaja, ranjit, singh, established, empire, based, punjab, empire, existed, from, 1799, when, maharaja, ranjit, singh, captured, lahore, 1849,. Not to be confused with Kingdom of Sikkim The Sikh Empire was a state originating in the Indian subcontinent formed under the leadership of Maharaja Ranjit Singh who established an empire based in the Punjab 8 The empire existed from 1799 when Maharaja Ranjit Singh captured Lahore to 1849 when it was defeated and conquered in the Second Anglo Sikh War It was forged on the foundations of the Khalsa from a collection of autonomous Sikh Misl 1 9 At its peak in the 19th century the Empire extended from Gilgit and Tibet in the north to the deserts of Sindh in the south and from the Khyber Pass in the west to the Sutlej in the east as far as Oudh 10 11 It was divided into four provinces Lahore in Punjab which became the Sikh capital Multan also in Punjab Peshawar and Kashmir from 1799 to 1849 Religiously diverse with an estimated population of 4 5 million in 1831 making it the 19th most populous country at the time 12 it was the last major region of the Indian subcontinent to be annexed by the British Empire Sikh Empireسرکار خالصه Sarkar i Khalsaਖ ਲਸ ਰ ਜ Khalasa Raj1799 1849FlagMotto ਅਕ ਲ ਸਹ ਇAkal Sahai With God s Grace Anthem ਦ ਗ ਤ ਗ ਫ ਤ ਹDeġ Teġ Fatih Victory to Charity and Arms Sikh Empire at the death of Ranjit Singh in 1839CapitalGujranwala 1799 1802 Lahore 1802 1849 Court languagePersian 1 2 3 Spoken languagesPunjabi dynastic Punjabi dialects Saraiki Hindko Pahari Pothwari KangriDogriPashtoKashmiriGojriKundal ShahiBaltiShinaWakhiBurushaskiKhowarDomakiLadakhiPurgiBhadarwahiShinaBateriKohistaniKalashaReligionSikhism 6 12 dynastic Islam 50 80 majority Hinduism 10 40 Buddhism 1 mostly in Ladakh Christianity 1 including Firangi soldiers and officials Judaism 1 including Firangi soldiers and officials GovernmentFederal monarchyMaharaja 1801 1839Ranjit Singh 1839Kharak Singh 1839 1840Nau Nihal Singh 1841 1843Sher Singh 1843 1849Duleep SinghRegent 1840 1841Chand Kaur 1843 1846Jind KaurWazir 1799 1818Jamadar Khushal Singh 4 1818 1843Dhian Singh Dogra 1843 1844Hira Singh Dogra 14 May 21 September 1845Jawahar Singh Aulakh 1845 1846Lal Singh 31 January 9 March 1846Gulab Singh 5 Historical eraEarly modern period Capture of Lahore by Ranjit Singh7 July 1799 End of Second Anglo Sikh War29 March 1849Area1839 6 520 000 km2 200 000 sq mi Population 1800s12 000 000 7 CurrencyNanak Shahi SikkePreceded by Succeeded byKangra StateMughal EmpireDurrani EmpireMaratha EmpireSikh Confederacy Bhangi Misl Dallewalia Misl Kanhaiya Misl Nakai Misl Ramgarhia Misl Singhpuria Misl Sukerchakia Misl Shaheedan Misl Ahluwalia Misl Company rule in India Jammu and Kashmir princely state Punjab Province British India Today part ofPakistan China IndiaThe foundations of the Sikh Empire can be traced to as early as 1707 the year of Aurangzeb s death and the start of the downfall of the Mughal Empire With the Mughals significantly weakened the Sikh army known as the Dal Khalsa a rearrangement of the Khalsa inaugurated by Guru Gobind Singh led expeditions against them and the Afghans in the west This led to a growth of the army which split into different confederacies or semi independent misls Each of these component armies controlled different areas and cities However in the period from 1762 to 1799 Sikh commanders of the misls appeared to be coming into their own as independent The formation of the empire began with the capture of Lahore by Ranjit Singh from its Afghan ruler Zaman Shah Durrani and the subsequent and progressive expulsion of Afghans from the Punjab by capitalizing off Afghan decline in the Afghan Sikh Wars and the unification of the separate Sikh misls Ranjit Singh was proclaimed as Maharaja of the Punjab on 12 April 1801 to coincide with Vaisakhi creating a unified political state Sahib Singh Bedi a descendant of Guru Nanak conducted the coronation 13 Ranjit Singh rose to power in a very short period from a leader of a single misl to finally becoming the Maharaja of Punjab He began to modernise his army using the latest training as well as weapons and artillery After the death of Maharaja Ranjit Singh the empire was weakened by the British East India Company stoking internal divisions and political mismanagement Finally by 1849 the state was dissolved after the defeat in the Second Anglo Sikh War Contents 1 Background 1 1 Mughal rule of Punjab 1 2 Formation of the Khalsa 1 3 Banda Singh Bahadur 2 History 2 1 Dal Khalsa period 2 1 1 Sikh Confederacy 2 1 2 Cis Sutlej states 2 1 3 Intra Misl Wars 2 2 Empire 2 2 1 Geography 2 2 2 Religious policy 2 2 3 Administration 3 Demography 4 Revenue 5 Decline 6 Timeline 7 List of rulers 8 Gallery 9 See also 10 References 10 1 Citations 10 2 Sources 11 Further reading 12 External linksBackground EditMughal rule of Punjab Edit The Sikh religion began around the time of the conquest of the Northern Indian subcontinent by Babur the founder of the Mughal Empire His conquering grandson Mughal Emperor Akbar supported religious freedom and after visiting the langar of Guru Amar Das got a favourable impression of Sikhism As a result of his visit he donated land to the langar and the Mughals did not have any conflict with Sikh gurus until his death in 1605 14 His successor Jahangir saw the Sikhs as a political threat He ordered Guru Arjun Dev who had been arrested for supporting the rebellious Khusrau Mirza 15 to change the passage about Islam in the Adi Granth When the Guru refused Jahangir ordered him to be put to death by torture 16 Guru Arjan Dev s martyrdom led to the sixth Guru Guru Hargobind declaring Sikh sovereignty in the creation of the Akal Takht and the establishment of a fort to defend Amritsar 17 Jahangir attempted to assert authority over the Sikhs by jailing Guru Hargobind at Gwalior but released him after a number of years when he no longer felt threatened The Sikh community did not have any further issues with the Mughal empire until the death of Jahangir in 1627 The succeeding son of Jahangir Shah Jahan took offence at Guru Hargobind s sovereignty and after a series of assaults on Amritsar forced the Sikhs to retreat to the Sivalik Hills 17 The next guru Guru Har Rai maintained the guruship in these hills by defeating local attempts to seize Sikh land and playing a neutral role in the power struggle between two of the sons of Shah Jahan Aurangzeb and Dara Shikoh for control of the Mughal Empire The ninth Guru Guru Tegh Bahadur moved the Sikh community to Anandpur and travelled extensively to visit and preach in defiance of Aurangzeb who attempted to install Ram Rai as new guru Guru Tegh Bahadur aided Kashmiri Pandits in avoiding conversion to Islam and was arrested by Aurangzeb When offered a choice between conversion to Islam and death he chose to die rather than compromise his principles and was executed 18 Formation of the Khalsa Edit Guru Gobind Singh assumed the guruship in 1675 and to avoid battles with Sivalik Hill rajas moved the guruship to Paunta There he built a large fort to protect the city and garrisoned an army to protect it The growing power of the Sikh community alarmed the Sivalik Hill rajas who attempted to attack the city but Guru Gobind Singh s forces routed them at the Battle of Bhangani He moved on to Anandpur and established the Khalsa a collective army of baptised Sikhs on 30 March 1699 19 The establishment of the Khalsa united the Sikh community against various Mughal backed claimants to the guruship 20 In 1701 a combined army of the Sivalik Hill rajas and the Mughals under Wazir Khan attacked Anandpur The Khalsa retreated but regrouped to defeat the Mughals at the Battle of Muktsar In 1707 Guru Gobind Singh accepted an invitation by Aurangzeb s successor Bahadur Shah I to meet him The meeting took place at Agra on 23 July 1707 19 Banda Singh Bahadur Edit In August 1708 Guru Gobind Singh visited Nanded There he met a Bairagi recluse Madho Das who converted to Sikhism rechristened as Banda Singh Bahadur 19 21 A short time before his death Guru Gobind Singh ordered him to reconquer Punjab region and gave him a letter that commanded all Sikhs to join him After two years of gaining supporters Banda Singh Bahadur initiated an agrarian uprising by breaking up the large estates of Zamindar families and distributing the land to the poor peasants who farmed the land 22 Banda Singh Bahadur started his rebellion with the defeat of Mughal armies at Samana and Sadhaura and the rebellion culminated in the defeat of Sirhind During the rebellion Banda Singh Bahadur made a point of destroying the cities in which Mughals had been cruel to the supporters of Guru Gobind Singh He executed Wazir Khan in revenge for the deaths of Guru Gobind Singh s sons and Pir Budhu Shah after the Sikh victory at Sirhind 23 He ruled the territory between the Sutlej river and the Yamuna river established a capital in the Himalayas at Lohgarh and struck coinage in the names of Guru Nanak and Guru Gobind Singh 22 In 1716 his army was defeated by the Mughals after he attempted to defend his fort at Gurdas Nangal He was captured along with 700 of his men and sent to Delhi where they were all tortured and executed after refusing to convert to Islam 24 History EditDal Khalsa period Edit Main article Dal Khalsa Sikh Empire Sikh Confederacy Edit Main article Misl The period from 1716 to 1799 was a highly turbulent time politically and militarily in the Punjab region This was caused by the overall decline of the Mughal empire 25 that left a power vacuum in the region that was eventually filled by the Sikhs of the Dal Khalsa meaning Khalsa army or Khalsa party In the late 18th century after defeating several invasions by the Afghan rulers of the Durrani Empire and their allies 26 remnants of the Mughals and their administrators the Mughal allied Hindu hill rajas of the Sivalik Hills 27 28 and hostile local Muslims siding with other Muslim forces 26 The Sikhs of the Dal Khalsa eventually formed their own independent Sikh administrative regions Misls derived from a Perso Arabic term meaning similar headed by Misldars These Misls were united in large part by Maharaja Ranjit Singh Cis Sutlej states Edit The Cis Sutlej states were a group of Sikh 29 states in the Punjab region lying between the Sutlej River to the north the Himalayas to the east the Yamuna River and Delhi district to the south and Sirsa District to the west These states fell under the suzerainty of the Maratha Empire after 1785 before the Second Anglo Maratha War of 1803 1805 after which the Marathas lost control of the territory to the British East India Company The Cis Sutlej states included Kalsia Kaithal Patiala State Nabha State Jind State Thanesar Maler Kotla Ludhiana Kapurthala State Ambala Ferozpur and Faridkot State among others 30 While these Sikh states had been set up by the Dal Khalsa they did not become part of the Sikh Empire There was a mutual ban on warfare following the treaty of Amritsar in 1809 in which the empire forfeited the claim to the Cis Sutlej States and the British were not to interfere north of the Sutlej or in the empire s existing territory south of the Sutlej 31 following attempts by Ranjit Singh to wrest control of these states from the British between 1806 and 1809 32 33 The Sikh crossing of the Sutlej following British militarization of the border with Punjab from 2 500 men and six guns in 1838 to 17 612 men and 66 guns in 1844 and 40 523 men and 94 guns in 1845 and plans on using the newly conquered territory of Sindh as a springboard to advance on the Sikh held region of Multan 34 eventually resulted in conflict with the British Intra Misl Wars Edit This section needs additional citations for verification Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources in this section Unsourced material may be challenged and removed November 2022 Learn how and when to remove this template message After the reign of Jassa Singh Ramgarhia the Sikh Misls became divided and fought each other A sort of Cold War broke out with the Bhangi Nakkai Dalelwala and Ramgharia Misls verses Sukerchakia Ahluwalia Karor Singhia and Kaniyeha The Shaheedan Nishania and Singhpuria also allied but did not engage in warfare with the others and continued the Dal Khalsa The Phulkian Misl was excommunicated from the confederacy Rani Sada Kaur of the Kanhaiya Misl rose in the vacuum and destroyed the power of the Bhangis She later gave her throne to Maharaja Ranjit Singh Empire Edit The expanding empire in 1809 The Cis Sutlej states are visible south of the Sutlej river The formal start of the Sikh Empire began with the unification of the Misls by 1801 creating a unified political state All the Misl leaders who were affiliated with the army were the nobility with usually long and prestigious family backgrounds in Sikh history 1 The main geographical footprint of the empire was from the Punjab region to Khyber Pass in the west to Kashmir in the north Sindh in the south and Tibet in the east 35 In 1799 Ranjit Singh moved the capital to Lahore from Gujranwala where it had been established in 1763 by his grandfather Charat Singh 36 Ranjit Singh holding court in 1838 Hari Singh Nalwa was Commander in Chief of the Sikh Khalsa Army from 1825 to 1837 37 He is known for his role in the conquests of Kasur Sialkot Multan Kashmir Attock and Peshawar Nalwa led the Sikh army in freeing Shah Shuja from Kashmir and secured the Koh i Nor diamond for Maharaja Ranjit Singh He served as governor of Kashmir and Hazara and established a mint on behalf of the Sikh empire to facilitate revenue collection His frontier policy of holding the Khyber Pass was later used by the British Raj Nalwa was responsible for expanding the frontier of Sikh empire to the Indus River At the time of his death the western boundary of the Sikh Empire was the Khyber Pass Geography Edit Indian subcontinent in 1805 The Sikh Empire spanned a total of over 200 000 sq mi 520 000 km2 at its zenith 38 39 40 Another more conservative estimate puts its total surface area during its zenith at 100 436 sq mi 260 124 km sq 41 The following modern day political divisions made up the historical Sikh Empire Punjab region to Mithankot in the south Punjab Pakistan excluding Bahawalpur State Punjab India excluding the Cis Sutlej states Himachal Pradesh India only the territories northwest of Sutlej river Jammu Division Jammu and Kashmir India and Pakistan 1808 1846 Kashmir from 5 July 1819 to 15 March 1846 India Pakistan China 42 43 Kashmir Valley India from 1819 to 1846 Gilgit Gilgit Baltistan Pakistan from 1842 to 1846 citation needed Ladakh India 1834 1846 44 45 Khyber Pass Afghanistan Pakistan 46 Peshawar Pakistan 47 taken in 1818 retaken in 1834 Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas Pakistan documented from Hazara taken in 1818 again in 1836 to Bannu 48 Parts of Western Tibet 49 China briefly in 1841 to Taklakot 50 Jamrud District Khyber Agency Pakistan was the westernmost limit of the Sikh Empire The westward expansion was stopped in the Battle of Jamrud in which the Afghans managed to kill the prominent Sikh general Hari Singh Nalwa in an offensive though the Sikhs successfully held their position at their Jamrud fort Ranjit Singh sent his General Sirdar Bahadur Gulab Singh Powind thereafter as reinforcement and he crushed the Pashtun rebellion harshly 51 In 1838 Ranjit Singh with his troops marched into Kabul to take part in the victory parade along with the British after restoring Shah Shoja to the Afghan throne at Kabul 52 Religious policy Edit Nanakshahi coins of Sikh empire The Sikh Empire was idiosyncratic in that it allowed men from religions other than their own to rise to commanding positions of authority 53 The Fakir brothers were trusted personal advisors and assistants as well as close friends to Ranjit Singh 54 particularly Fakir Azizuddin who would serve in the positions of foreign minister of the empire and translator for the maharaja and played important roles in such important events as the negotiations with the British during which he convinced Ranjit Singh to maintain diplomatic ties with the British and not to go to war with them in 1808 as British troops were moved along the Sutlej in pursuance of the British policy of confining Ranjit Singh to the north of the river and setting the Sutlej as the dividing boundary between the Sikh and British empires 55 negotiating with Dost Muhammad Khan during his unsuccessful attempt to retake Peshawar 55 and ensuring the succession of the throne during the Maharaja s last days in addition to caretaking after a stroke as well as occasional military assignments throughout his career 56 The Fakir brothers were introduced to the Maharaja when their father Ghulam Muhiuddin a physician was summoned by him to treat an eye ailment soon after his capture of Lahore 57 The other Fakir brothers were Imamuddin one of his principal administration officers and Nuruddin who served as home minister and personal physician were also granted jagirs by the Maharaja 58 Every year while at Amritsar Ranjit Singh visited shrines of holy people of other faiths including several Muslim saints which did not offend even the most religious Sikhs of his administration 59 As relayed by Fakir Nuruddin orders were issued to treat people of all faith groups occupations 60 and social levels equally and in accordance with the doctrines of their faith per the Shastras and the Quran as well as local authorities like judges and panches local elder councils 61 as well as banning forcible possession of others land or of inhabited houses to be demolished 62 There were special courts for Muslims which ruled in accordance to Muslim law in personal matters 63 and common courts preceded over by judicial officers which administered justice under the customary law of the districts and socio ethnic groups and were open to all who wanted to be governed by customary religious law whether Hindu Sikh or Muslim 63 One of Ranjit Singh s first acts after the 1799 capture of Lahore was to revive the offices of the hereditary Qazis and Muftis which had been prevalent in Mughal times 63 Kazi Nizamuddin was appointed to decide marital issues among Muslims while Muftis Mohammad Shahpuri and Sadulla Chishti were entrusted with powers to draw up title deeds relating to transfers of immovable property 63 The old mohalladari definition needed system was reintroduced with each mahallah or neighborhood subdivision placed under the charge of one of its members The office of Kotwal or prefect of police was conferred upon a Muslim Imam Bakhsh 63 Generals were also drawn from a variety of communities along with prominent Sikh generals like Hari Singh Nalwa Fateh Singh Dullewalia Nihal Singh Atariwala Chattar Singh Attariwalla and Fateh Singh Kalianwala Hindu generals included Misr Diwan Chand and Dewan Mokham Chand Nayyar his son and his grandson and Muslim generals included Ilahi Bakhsh and Mian Ghaus Khan one general Balbhadra Kunwar was a Nepalese Gurkha and European generals included Jean Francois Allard Jean Baptiste Ventura and Paolo Avitabile 64 other notable generals of the Sikh Khalsa Army were Veer Singh Dhillon Sham Singh Attariwala Mahan Singh Mirpuri and Zorawar Singh Kahluria among others The appointment of key posts in public offices was based on merit and loyalty regardless of the social group or religion of the appointees both in and around the court and in higher as well as lower posts Key posts in the civil and military administration were held by members of communities from all over the empire and beyond including Sikhs Muslims Khatris Brahmins Dogras Rajputs Pashtuns Europeans and Americans among others 65 and worked their way up the hierarchy to attain merit Dhian Singh the prime minister was a Dogra whose brothers Gulab Singh and Suchet Singh served in the high ranking administrative and military posts respectively 65 Brahmins like finance minister Raja Dina Nath Sahib Dyal and others also served in financial capacities 64 Muslims in prominent positions included the Fakir brothers Kazi Nizamuddin and Mufti Muhammad Shah among others Among the top ranking Muslim officers there were two ministers one governor and several district officers there were 41 high ranking Muslim officers in the army including two generals and several colonels 64 and 92 Muslims were senior officers in the police judiciary legal department and supply and store departments 64 In artillery Muslims represented over 50 of the numbers while the cavalry had some 10 Muslims from among the troopers 66 Thus the government was run by an elite corps drawn from many communities giving the empire the character of a secular system of government even when built on theocratic foundations 67 A ban on cow slaughter which can be related to Hindu sentiments was universally imposed in the Sarkar Khalsaji 68 69 Ranjit Singh also donated large amounts of gold for the plating of the Kashi Vishwanath Temple s dome 70 71 The Sikhs attempted not to offend the prejudices of Muslims noted Baron von Hugel the Austrian botanist and explorer 72 yet the Sikhs were described as harsh In this regard Masson s explanation is perhaps the most pertinent Though compared to the Afghans the Sikhs were mild and exerted a protecting influence yet no advantages could compensate to their Mohammedan subjects the idea of subjection to infidels and the prohibition to slay kine and to repeat the azan or summons to prayer 73 Chitralekha Zutshi and William Roe Polk write that Sikh governors adopted policies that alienated the Muslim population such as the ban on cow slaughter and the azan the Islamic call to prayer the seizure of mosques as property of the state and imposed ruinous taxes on Kashmiri Muslims causing a famine in 1832 In addition begar forced labour was imposed by the Sikh administration to facilitate the supply of materials to the imperial army a policy that was augmented by the successive Dogra rulers 74 75 76 These policies led the Kashmiri Muslim population to emirgate en masse to more lenient neighboring countries particularly Ladakh 77 As a symbolic assertion of power the Sikhs regularly desecrated Muslim places of worship including closing of the Jamia Masjid in Srinagar and the conversion of the Badshahi Mosque in Lahore to an ammunition store and horse stable but the empire still maintained Persian administrative institutions and court etiquette the Sikh silver rupees were minted on the Mughal standard with Persian legends 78 79 In 1839 a major pogrom called the Allahdad targeting the local Jews of Mashhad in Qajar Persia had occurred A group of Persian Jewish refugees from Mashhad escaping persecution back home in Qajar Persia were granted rights to settle in the Sikh Empire around the year 1839 Most of the Jewish families settled in Rawalpindi specifically in the Babu Mohallah neighbourhood and Peshawar 80 81 82 83 Most of these Jews would leave for India during the partition of 1947 84 Christian missionaries had been active in the Punjab even prior to the dissolution of the empire in 1849 85 Administration Edit Detail from Darbar royal court of Maharaja Ranjit Singh gouache ca 1850This section needs expansion with Please add the governors capitals borders major cities etc for the various provinces of the Sikh Empire with sources You can help by adding to it March 2023 The empire was divided into various provinces known as Subas them namely being 41 No Name Estimated population 1838 Major population centre1 Lahore Suba 1 900 000 Lahore2 Multan Suba 750 000 Multan3 Peshawar Suba 550 000 Peshawar4 Derajat Suba 600 000 Dera Ghazi Khan Dera Ismail Khan5 Jammu and Hill States Suba 1 100 000 SrinagarDemography EditReligions in Khalsa Empire 1800s 7 86 2694 Religions PercentIslam 69 Hinduism 24 Sikhism 6 others 1 The population of the Sikh empire during the time of Ranjit Singh s rule was estimated to be around 12 million people 7 There were 8 4 million Muslims 2 88 million Hindus and 7 22 Lakhs Sikhs 86 The religious demography of the empire is estimated to have been just over 10 87 to 12 88 Sikh 80 Muslim 87 and just under 10 Hindu 87 Surjit Hans gave different numbers by retrospectively projecting the 1881 census putting Muslims at 51 Hindus at 40 and Sikhs at around 8 the remaining 1 being Europeans 89 The population was 3 5 million in 1831 according to Amarinder Singh s The Last Sunset The Rise and Fall of the Lahore Durbar 90 Hans Herrli in The Coins of the Sikhs estimated the total population of the empire to be around 5 35 million during 1838 41 An estimated 90 of the Sikh population at the time and more than half of the total population was concentrated in the upper Bari Doabs Jalandhar and upper Rechna Doabs and in the areas of their greatest concentration formed about one third of the population in the 1830s half of the Sikh population of this core region was in the area covered by the later districts of Lahore and Amritsar 91 Revenue EditRevenue in Rupees 1844 92 Sr Particulars Revenue in Rupees1 Land Revenue1 a Tributary States 5 65 0001 b Farms 1 79 85 0001 c Eleemosynary 20 00 0001 d Jaghirs 95 25 0002 Customs 24 00 000Total 3 24 75 000Decline Edit Two late 19th century drawings of Sikh troops in action against British forces during the Anglo Sikh Wars The Samadhi of Ranjit Singh is located in Lahore Pakistan adjacent to the iconic Badshahi Mosque After Ranjit Singh s death in 1839 the empire was severely weakened by internal divisions and political mismanagement This opportunity was used by the British East India Company to launch the First Anglo Sikh War The Battle of Ferozeshah in 1845 marked many turning points the British encountered the Punjab Army opening with a gun duel in which the Sikhs had the better of the British artillery As the British made advances Europeans in their army were specially targeted as the Sikhs believed if the army became demoralized the backbone of the enemy s position would be broken 93 The fighting continued throughout the night The British position grew graver as the night wore on and suffered terrible casualties with every single member of the Governor General s staff either killed or wounded 94 Nevertheless the British army took and held Ferozeshah British General Sir James Hope Grant recorded Truly the night was one of gloom and forbidding and perhaps never in the annals of warfare has a British Army on such a large scale been nearer to a defeat which would have involved annihilation 94 The reasons for the withdrawal of the Sikhs from Ferozeshah are contentious Some believe that it was treachery of the non Sikh high command of their own army which led to them marching away from a British force in a precarious and battered state Others believe that a tactical withdrawal was the best policy citation needed The Sikh empire was finally dissolved at the end of the Second Anglo Sikh War in 1849 into separate princely states and the British province of Punjab Eventually a Lieutenant Governorship was formed in Lahore as a direct representative of the British Crown Timeline Edit1699 Formation of the Khalsa by Guru Gobind Singh 1710 1716 Banda Singh defeats the Mughals and declares Khalsa rule 1716 1738 Turbulence no real ruler Mughals take back the control for two decades but Sikhs engage in guerrilla warfare 1733 1735 The Khalsa accepts only to reject the confederal status given by the Mughals 1748 1757 Afghan invasion of Ahmad Shah Durrani 1761 1767 Recapture of Punjab region by Afghan in Third Battle of Panipat 1763 1774 Charat Singh Sukerchakia Misldar of Sukerchakia misl establishes himself in Gujranwala 1764 1783 Baba Baghel Singh Misldar of Singh Krora Misl imposes taxes on the Mughals 1783 Sikh capture of Delhi and the Red Fort from the Mughals 1773 Ahmad Shah Durrani dies and his son Timur Shah launches several invasions into Punjab 1774 1790 Maha Singh becomes Misldar of the Sukerchakia misl The Battle of Sobraon in 1846 Contemporary painting 1790 1801 Ranjit Singh becomes Misldar of the Sukerchakia misl 1799 formation of the Sikh Khalsa Army 12 April 1801 coronation 27 June 1839 reign of Maharaja Ranjit Singh March 1809 August 1809 Nepal Sikh War 20 February 1810 Siege of Multan 1810 1 June 1813 Ranjit Singh is given the Kohinoor Diamond 13 July 1813 Battle of Attock the Sikh Empire s first significant victory over the Durrani Empire March 2 June 1818 Battle of Multan the 2nd battle in the Afghan Sikh wars 3 July 1819 Battle of Shopian The charge of the British 16th Lancers at Aliwal on 28 January 1846 during the First Anglo Sikh War 14 March 1823 Battle of Nowshera 30 April 1837 Battle of Jamrud 27 June 1839 5 November 1840 Reign of Maharaja Kharak Singh 5 November 1840 18 January 1841 Chand Kaur is briefly Regent 18 January 1841 15 September 1843 Reign of Maharaja Sher Singh May 1841 August 1842 Sino Sikh war 15 September 1843 31 March 1849 Reign of Maharaja Duleep Singh 1845 1846 First Anglo Sikh War 1848 1849 Second Anglo Sikh WarList of rulers EditS No Name Portrait Birth and death Reign Note1 Maharaja Ranjit Singh 13 November 1780 Gujranwala 27 June 1839 Lahore 12 April 1801 27 June 1839 38 years 76 days The first Sikh ruler Stroke2 Maharaja Kharak Singh 22 February 1801 Lahore 5 November 1840 Lahore 27 June 1839 8 October 1839 103 days Son of Ranjit Singh Poisoning3 Maharaja Nau Nihal Singh 11 February 1820 Lahore 6 November 1840 Lahore 8 October 1839 6 November 1840 1 year 29 days Son of Kharak Singh Assassinated4 Maharani Chand Kaur 1802 Fatehgarh Churian 11 June 1842 Lahore 6 November 1840 18 January 1841 73 days Wife of Kharak Singh and the only female ruler of Sikh Empire Abdicated5 Maharaja Sher Singh 4 December 1807 Batala 15 September 1843 Lahore 18 January 1841 15 September 1843 2 years 240 days Son of Ranjit Singh Assassinated6 Maharaja Duleep Singh 6 September 1838 Lahore 22 October 1893 Paris 15 September 1843 29 March 1849 5 years 195 days Son of Ranjit Singh Exiled7 Maharani Jind Kaur regent nominal 1817 Gujranwala 1 August 1863 Kensington 15 September 1843 29 March 1849 5 years 195 days Wife of Ranjit Singh ExiledGallery Edit Ranjit Singh c 1830 95 Ranjit Singh listening to Guru Granth Sahib being recited near the Akal Takht and Golden Temple Amritsar Punjab India Sikh warrior helmet with butted mail neckguard 1820 1840 iron overlaid with gold with mail neckguard of iron and brass A letter sent from the King of France Louis Philippe to Maharaja Ranjit Singh Ranjit Singh is addressed as Rendjit Sing Bahador Padichah du Pendjab Dated 27 October 1835Preceded bySukerchakia Misl Sikh Empire1799 1849 Succeeded byEast India CompanySee also Edit Punjab portal History portalHistory of Punjab History of Pakistan History of India Kapurthala State Mughal Empire Sikh Khalsa ArmyReferences EditCitations Edit a b c Chisholm Hugh ed 1911 Ranjit Singh Encyclopaedia Britannica Vol 22 11th ed Cambridge University Press p 892 Grewal J S 1990 The Sikhs of the Punjab Chapter 6 The Sikh empire 1799 1849 The New Cambridge History of India Cambridge University Press p 112 ISBN 0 521 63764 3 The continuance of Persian as the language of administration Fenech Louis E 2013 The Sikh Zafar namah of Guru Gobind Singh A Discursive Blade in the Heart of the Mughal Empire Oxford University Press USA p 239 ISBN 978 0199931453 We see such acquaintance clearly within the Sikh court of Maharaja Ranjit Singh for example the principal language of which was Persian Grewal J S 1990 The Sikhs of the Punjab Cambridge University Press p 107 ISBN 0 521 63764 3 Retrieved 15 April 2014 Satinder Singh Raja Gulab Singh s Role 1971 pp 46 50 sfn error no target CITEREFSatinder Singh Raja Gulab Singh s Role1971 help Singh Amarpal 15 August 2010 The First Anglo Sikh War Amberley Publishing Limited ISBN 978 1 4456 2038 1 By 1839 the year of his death the Sikh kingdom extended from Tibet and Kashmir to Sind and from the Khyber Pass to the Himalayas in the east It spanned 600 miles from east to west and 350 miles from north to south comprising an area of just over 200 000 square miles a b c Singh Pashaura 2016 Sikh Empire The Encyclopedia of Empire pp 1 6 doi 10 1002 9781118455074 wbeoe314 ISBN 9781118455074 Ranjit Singh A Secular Sikh Sovereign by K S Duggal Date 1989 ISBN 8170172446 Exoticindiaart com 3 September 2015 Retrieved 9 August 2009 Grewal J S 1990 The Sikhs of the Punjab Chapter 6 The Sikh empire 1799 1849 The New Cambridge History of India Cambridge University Press ISBN 0 521 63764 3 Gupta Hari Ram 1991 History of the Sikhs Munshiram Manoharlal p 201 ISBN 9788121505154 Singh Khushwant 2004 History of the Sikhs Oxford University Press pp viii ISBN 9780195673081 Amarinder Singh s The Last Sunset The Rise and Fall of the Lahore Durbar The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism Archived 8 May 2014 at the Wayback Machine section Sahib Siṅgh Bedi Baba 1756 1834 Kalsi 2005 pp 106 107 Markovits 2004 p 98 Melton J Gordon 15 January 2014 Faiths Across Time 5 000 Years of Religious History ABC CLIO p 1163 ISBN 9781610690263 Retrieved 3 November 2014 a b Jestice 2004 pp 345 346 Johar 1975 pp 192 210 a b c Ganda Singh Gobind Singh Guru 1666 1708 Encyclopaedia of Sikhism Punjabi University Patiala Archived from the original on 8 May 2014 Retrieved 11 August 2014 Jestice 2004 pp 312 313 Banda Singh Bahadur Encyclopaedia Britannica Retrieved 15 May 2013 a b Singh 2008 pp 25 26 Nesbitt 2005 p 61 Singh Kulwant 2006 Sri Gur Panth Prakash Episodes 1 to 81 Institute of Sikh Studies p 415 ISBN 9788185815282 Sikh Period National Fund for Cultural Heritage Heritage gov pk 14 August 1947 Retrieved 9 August 2009 a b Meredith L Runion The History of Afghanistan pp 70 Greenwood Publishing Group 2007 ISBN 0313337985 Patwant Singh 2007 The Sikhs Crown Publishing Group p 270 ISBN 9780307429339 Sikhs Relation with Hill States www thesikhencyclopedia com 19 December 2000 Retrieved 13 April 2019 Jayanta Kumar Ray 2007 Aspects of India s International Relations 1700 to 2000 South Asia and the World Pearson Education p 379 ISBN 9788131708347 Jayanta Kumar Ray 2007 Aspects of India s International Relations 1700 to 2000 South Asia and the World Pearson Education p 379 ISBN 9788131708347 Lt Gen Kirpal Singh Randhawa PVSM AVSM Retd Sikh Wars www sikh heritage co uk Retrieved 13 April 2019 a href Template Cite web html title Template Cite web cite web a CS1 maint multiple names authors list link Jayanta Kumar Ray 2007 Aspects of India s International Relations 1700 to 2000 South Asia and the World Pearson Education pp 379 380 ISBN 9788131708347 Sangat Singh the Sikhs in History Jayanta Kumar Ray 2007 Aspects of India s International Relations 1700 to 2000 South Asia and the World Pearson Education p 381 ISBN 9788131708347 Gupta Hari Ram 1991 History of the Sikhs Munshiram Manoharlal ISBN 9788121505154 World and Its Peoples Middle East Western Asia and Northern Africa Marshall Cavendish 2007 p 411 ISBN 9780761475712 Roy K Roy L D H K 2011 War Culture and Society in Early Modern South Asia 1740 1849 Taylor amp Francis p 147 ISBN 9781136790874 Retrieved 10 December 2014 Manning Stephen 30 September 2020 Bayonet to Barrage Weaponry on the Victorian Battlefield Pen amp Sword Books Limited ISBN 9781526777249 The Sikh kingdom expanded from Tibet in the east to Kashmir in the west and from Sind in the south to the Khyber Pass in the north an area of 200 000 square miles Barczewski Stephanie 22 March 2016 Heroic Failure and the British Yale University Press p 89 ISBN 9780300186819 the Sikh state encompassed over 200 000 square miles 518 000 sq km Khilani N M 1972 British power in the Punjab 1839 1858 Asia Publishing House p 251 ISBN 9780210271872 into existence a kingdom of the Punjab of over 200 000 square miles a b c Herrli Hans 1993 The Coins of the Sikhs p 10 The Masters Revealed Johnson p 128 Britain and Tibet 1765 1947 Marshall p 116 Pandey Dr Hemant Kumar Singh Manish Raj 2017 India s Major Military and Rescue Operations Horizon Books p 57 ISBN 9789386369390 Deng Jonathan M 2010 Frontier The Making of the Northern and Eastern Border in Ladakh From 1834 to the Present SIT Digital Collections Independent Study Project ISP Collection 920 The Khyber Pass A History of Empire and Invasion Docherty p 187 The Khyber Pass A History of Empire and Invasion Docherty pp 185 187 Bennett Jones Owen Singh Sarina Pakistan amp the Karakoram Highway Page 199 Waheeduddin 1981 p vii Kartar Singh Duggal 2001 Maharaja Ranjit Singh the Last to Lay Arms Abhinav Publications p 131 ISBN 9788170174103 Hastings Donnan Marriage Among Muslims Preference and Choice in Northern Pakistan Brill 1997 41 1 Encyclopaedia Britannica Ranjit Singh Kartar Singh Duggal 1 January 2001 Maharaja Ranjit Singh The Last to Lay Arms Abhinav Publications pp 125 126 ISBN 978 81 7017 410 3 Waheeduddin 1981 p ix a b Waheeduddin 1981 p 27 Waheeduddin 1981 p 28 Waheeduddin 1981 p 25 Waheeduddin 1981 p iv Waheeduddin 1981 p 3 Waheeduddin 1981 p 19 Waheeduddin 1981 p 17 Waheeduddin 1981 p 18 a b c d e Waheeduddin 1981 p 20 a b c d Waheeduddin 1981 p 23 a b Waheeduddin 1981 p 22 Singh Amarinder 2010 The Last Sunset The Rise and Fall of the Lahore Durbar Roli Books p 40 ISBN 978 81 7436 779 2 Waheeduddin 1981 p 24 Lodrick D O 1981 Sacred Cows Sacred Places Berkeley University of California Press p 145 Vigne G T 1840 A Personal Narrative of a Visit to Ghuzni Kabul and Afghanistan and a Residence at the Court of Dost Mohammed London Whittaker and Co p 246 The Real Ranjit Singh by Fakir Syed Waheeduddin published by Punjabi University ISBN 81 7380 778 7 1 January 2001 2nd ed Matthew Atmore Sherring 1868 The Sacred City of the Hindus An Account of Benares in Ancient and Modern Times Trubner amp co p 51 Madhuri Desai 2007 Resurrecting Banaras Urban Space Architecture and Religious Boundaries ISBN 978 0 549 52839 5 Hugel Baron 1845 2000 Travels in Kashmir and the Panjab containing a Particular Account of the Government and Character of the Sikhs tr Major T B Jervis rpt Delhi Low Price Publications p 151 Masson Charles 1842 Narrative of Various Journeys in Balochistan Afghanistan and the Panjab 3 v London Richard Bentley 1 37 Chitralekha Zutshi 11 September 2019 Kashmir Oxford University Press pp 39 40 ISBN 9780190990466 Polk William Roe January 2018 Crusade and Jihad The Thousand year War Between the Muslim World and the Global North Yale University Press p 263 ISBN 9780300222906 Bray John 31 July 2008 Modern Ladakh Anthropological Perspectives on Continuity and Change Brill p 48 ISBN 9789047443346 Dollfus Pascale 1995 The History of Muslims in Central Ladakh The Tibet Journal 20 3 41 ISSN 0970 5368 JSTOR 43300542 Ziad Waleed 16 November 2021 Hidden Caliphate Sufi Saints Beyond the Oxus and Indus Harvard University Press p 45 ISBN 978 0 674 24881 6 Chida Razvi Mehreen 20 September 2020 The Friday Mosque in the City Liminality Ritual and Politics Intellect Books pp 91 94 ISBN 978 1 78938 304 1 In addition to the masjid s use as a site for military storage stables for the cavalry horses and barracks for soldiers parts of it were also used as storage for powder magazines Tahir Saif 3 March 2016 The lost Jewish history of Rawalpindi Pakistan blogs timesofisrael com Retrieved 27 February 2023 The history of Jews in Rawalpindi dates back to 1839 when many Jewish families from Mashhad fled to save themselves from the persecutions and settled in various parts of subcontinent including Peshawar and Rawalpindi Considine Craig 2017 Islam race and pluralism in the Pakistani diaspora Milton Routledge ISBN 978 1 315 46276 9 OCLC 993691884 Khan Naveed Aman 12 May 2018 Pakistani Jews and PTI Daily Times Retrieved 27 February 2023 Rawalpindi Rawalpindi Development Authority Rawalpindi Development Authority rda gop pk Retrieved 27 February 2023 Jews first arrived in Rawalpindi s Babu Mohallah neighbourhood from Mashhad Persia in 1839 in order to flee from anti Jewish laws instituted by the Qajar dynasty Daiya Kavita 2008 Violent belongings partition gender and national culture in postcolonial India Philadelphia Temple University Press p 129 ISBN 978 1 59213 745 9 OCLC 302391286 Kumar Ram Narayan 1991 The Sikh struggle origin evolution and present phase Georg Sieberer Delhi Chanakya Publications p 100 ISBN 81 7001 083 7 OCLC 24339822 a b Puri Harish K June July 2003 Scheduled Castes in Sikh Community A Historical Perspective Economic and Political Weekly Economic and Political Weekly 38 26 2693 2701 JSTOR 4413731 a b c Kartar Singh Duggal 2001 Maharaja Ranjit Singh the Last to Lay Arms Abhinav Publications p 55 ISBN 9788170174103 J S Grewal 1998 The Sikhs of the Punjab Volumes 2 3 Cambridge University Press p 113 ISBN 9780521637640 Hans Surjit April 2006 Why are we sentimental about Ranjit Singh The Panjab Past and Present XXXVII Part 1 47 Singh Amarinder 2010 The Last Sunset The Rise and Fall of the Lahore Durbar Roli Books p 23 ISBN 978 81 7436 779 2 J S Grewal 1998 The Sikhs of the Punjab Volumes 2 3 Cambridge University Press p 113 ISBN 9780521637640 Cunningham Joseph Davey 1849 A History of the Sikhs from the Origin of the Nation to the Battles of the Sutlej London J Murray p 424 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint date and year link Ranjit Singh administration and British policy Prakash p 31 33 a b Maharaja Ranjit Singh the last to lay arms Duggal p 136 137 Miniature painting from the photo album of princely families in the Sikh and Rajput territories by Colonel James Skinner 1778 1841 Sources Edit Heath Ian 2005 The Sikh Army 1799 1849 Osprey Publishing UK ISBN 1 84176 777 8 Kalsi Sewa Singh 2005 Sikhism Religions of the World Chelsea House Publications ISBN 978 0 7910 8098 6 Markovits Claude 2004 A history of modern India 1480 1950 London England Anthem Press ISBN 978 1 84331 152 2 Jestice Phyllis G 2004 Holy people of the world a cross cultural encyclopedia Volume 3 ABC CLIO ISBN 978 1 57607 355 1 Johar Surinder Singh 1975 Guru Tegh Bahadur University of Wisconsin Madison Center for South Asian Studies ISBN 81 7017 030 3 Singh Pritam 2008 Federalism Nationalism and Development India and the Punjab Economy Routledge pp 25 26 ISBN 978 0 415 45666 1 Nesbitt Eleanor 2005 Sikhism A Very Short Introduction Oxford University Press USA p 61 ISBN 978 0 19 280601 7 Waheeduddin Fakir Syed 1981 The Real Ranjit Singh 1st ed Patiala Punjab India Punjabi University ISBN 978 8173807787 Retrieved 14 May 2019 Grewal J S 1998 The Sikhs of the Punjab The New Cambridge History of India II 3 Revised ed Cambridge United Kingdom Cambridge University Press pp 82 127 ISBN 9781316025338 Retrieved 16 April 2020 Further reading EditVolume 2 Evolution of Sikh Confederacies 1708 1769 By Hari Ram Gupta Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers Date 1999 ISBN 81 215 0540 2 383 pages illustrated The Sikh Army 1799 1849 Men at arms By Ian Heath Date 2005 ISBN 1 84176 777 8 The Heritage of the Sikhs By Harbans Singh Date 1994 ISBN 81 7304 064 8 Sikh Domination of the Mughal Empire Date 2000 Second Edition ISBN 81 215 0213 6 The Sikh Commonwealth or Rise and Fall of Sikh Misls Date 2001 revised edition ISBN 81 215 0165 2 Maharaja Ranjit Singh Lord of the Five Rivers By Jean Marie Lafont Oxford University Press Date 2002 ISBN 0 19 566111 7 History of Panjab By Dr L M Joshi and Dr Fauja Singh Maharaja Ranjit Singh and his Times By Bhagat Singh Sehgal Publishers Service Date 1990 ISBN 81 85477 01 9 Ranjit Singh monarch mystique By V Nalwa Hari Singh Nalwa Foundation Trust Date 2022 ISBN 978 81 910526 1 9 External links Edit Wikimedia Commons has media related to Sikh Empire Article on Coins of the Sikh Empire Sikh Confederacy Archived 1 August 2018 at the Wayback Machine Confederacy of Punjab Sikh Kingdom of Ranjit Singh Battle of Jamrud Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Sikh Empire amp oldid 1149504850, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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