Empire of the Sikhs

by Patwant Singh

Married four years earlier (1774) to another Raj Kaur, later known as Mai Malwain, daughter of Raja Gajpat Singh of Jind, Mahan Singh soon set about expanding the territories of the misl still further. From the Bhangi misl he annexed Issa Khel and Mussa Khel, then went for the Chatha Pathans of Rasulnagar whose territories lay along the River Chenab and who were briskly building fortifications and townships there. To tame Pir Muhammad, who headed the Chatha tribe, Mahan Singh laid siege to Rasulnagar, which held out for several months but eventually gave in to him. The Pathan Chathas at that time were highly respected for their fighting qualities, and in the strong base they were creating for themselves along the River Chenab Mahan Singh saw a future threat to his misl’s interests. Fortunately for him Pir Muhammad and his brother Ahmad Khan were bitter enemies, which enabled Mahan Singh to subdue them both, capturing their forts at Sayyidnagar and Kot Pir Muhammad as well as Rasulnagar.

  Mahan Singh was on his way home after the siege of Rasulnagar when he received news of the birth of his son Budh Singh on 13 November 1780. The first thing the father did on reaching home was to change the boy’s name to Ranjit – which not only meant ‘the victor of battles’ but was also the name of Guru Gobind’s war drums: a prophetic change.

  Mahan Singh was soon on the march again – this time to Jammu, in the Kashmir foothills. Through manipulative politics, inter-misl rivalries and clash of arms, Mahan Singh made his way to Jammu and ransacked it. Although he had agreed on a joint operation with the Kanhayia misl and an equal share in the booty, he left the Kanhayias out on both these counts. In their rapidly deteriorating relations the two misls frequently took to the battlefield, but in the end Mahan Singh’s forces prevailed, and the Kanhayia misl chief’s son Gurbaksh Singh was killed in one of their battles, although at the hands of the Ramgarhias.

  It should be noted that while the misl chiefs as a rule pooled their resources to fight an enemy they fought each other with equal zest if there was no enemy to take on. There are no known instances of a misl chief combining forces with a hostile regime or an invader to settle scores with a fellow misl chief, but conspiracies and changing alliances between the misls were constant, and in Mahan Singh’s time he emerged the victor wherever he intervened. Whether he prevailed over his adversaries in an entirely upright manner or through deceit has been endlessly debated. Many chroniclers say he often resorted to treachery against those who opposed him, starting with Pir Muhammad and Ghulam Muhammad of the Chathas, Raja Brij Raj Singh Deo of Jammu and another member of the Kanhayia misl, Haqiqat Singh, and convincing reasons have been provided in support of their criticism. But much has been written in his favour, too. It does seem, however, that he was less principled than his father Charat Singh and his son Ranjit Singh.

  What cannot be denied is that in his short span of twenty-nine years – he was felled by a sudden illness – he achieved far more than most other chiefs in those turbulent times. In addition to his legacy of expansion and consolidation, he set up an administrative structure for his misl, which was an overdue move few chiefs had attempted before. The first step he took was to appoint a diwan (minister) to handle everyday administration along lines specifically laid down. For his soldiery, for instance, he made a beginning by doing away with the spoils system, strictly enforcing the rule that whatever was plundered or seized as booty during a battle would be the property of the misl and not of individuals. All tributes and fines received would also accrue to the misl chief, not the officer in charge of operations. Records would also be maintained of all such income. In the same way, administration of territories acquired was also thought of for the first time, although it was Mahan Singh’s son who would establish a sound and enduring system of administrative control of the territories he added to his ever-expanding empire.

  While some historians are of the view that Ranjit Singh was born in Gujranwala (now in Pakistan), one of the towns newly developed by the Sikhs, others are convinced he was born in Badhrukhan near Jind, his mother’s home, about 250 miles south-east of Gujranwala. In the view of the historian Sir Gokul Chand Narang, who was an official in the British administration of Punjab in the years 1926-30, Ranjit Singh was ‘born in 1780 in Gujranwala at a spot in the Purani Mandi near the office of Gujranwala Municipal Committee, marked by a date-palm tree and a slab put up there probably by the Municipal Committee’.3 Several other British historians affirm Gujranwala as his birthplace. It has been claimed that up until 1947 a cradle was preserved in the room where Ranjit’s mother was confined, an annual holiday being traditionally observed in Gujranwala on the date of her son’s birthday.4 The historian Hari Ram Gupta, on the other hand, categorically rejects this assertion and claims Badhrukhan as his place of birth. A pre-Independence British gazetteer of undivided Punjab states that ‘Ranjit Singh … was born at Gujranwala and he made it his headquarters during the years which preceded the establishment of his supremacy and his occupation of Lahore in AD 1799.’5

  There may be different views about the birthplace, but there is agreement among numerous accounts of the wild rejoicings that followed the news of the heir’s arrival. Spectacular feasts and distribution of large sums of money among the poor continued for days on end in a city festooned with lights and alive as never before.

  SIKH MISLS IN THE LATE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

  Of Ranjit’s earliest years little detail has survived, but there is ample confirmation of the fact that he was adored and indulged by his doting family. He was sent to Bhagu Singh Dharamsala (centre of learning) in Gujranwala, where he learnt no more than a few numerals and acquired some knowledge of how to follow maps and charts, which was to stand him in good stead throughout his life. He showed no interest in the arts, mathematics or book-keeping but was instinctively drawn to agriculture and other disciplines that required physical input. After just one year he left the Bhagu Singh Dharamsala. He zestfully set about learning the martial arts – especially how to fight with sword and spear. He also loved to swim, wrestle, shoot and hunt, perhaps sensing that these were not the times in which scholarly pursuits would get him far. He revelled instead in the acquisition of the skills he knew he needed to be a warrior and to lead troops into battle. A Brahmin, Amir Singh, an expert with guns, taught him how to handle a musket.

  At the age of six, in 1786, he nearly lost his life to an attack of smallpox when, according to some accounts, he was with Mahan Singh at Jammu who, despite his high fever, took him back to Gujranwala Fort. But this version of events is contradicted by some historians who hold that Mahan Singh was campaigning in Jammu when he was informed of his son’s illness in Gujranwala. Be that as it may, it took twenty-one days for the fever to abate and several more days for the boy to open his eyes. When he did it was found that he had lost all sight in his left eye. Throughout his illness his father had prayers read out for him day and night from the Granth Sahib, the Hindu scriptures and the Koran. Money was distributed to the poor and donations for followers of all three faiths were sent to Sitla Devi (Goddess of the Smallpox Temple), Jawala Mukhi and the Kangra temples.

  The age of six seemed to have a special significance in Ranjit Singh’s life because his first marriage also took place in 1786 soon after he recovered from his illness. His bride Mehtab Kaur was five. The dating of this event, too, is a matter of controversy, some records stating that he was sixteen when he married. Most of the evidence, however, points to the earlier date. Marriages in those days were usually arranged for political or dynastic reasons, and the practice was to book them early lest other parents with similar concerns stole a march in the marriage market. The Sukerchakia and Kanhayia misls being among the foremost of the twelve, Ranjit Singh’s marriage to the daughter of the Kanhayias promised to forge an enviable alliance. No one was more aware of this than Mehtab Kaur’s mother Sada Kaur, who would take over the leadership of the Kanhayias in 1789 on the death of her father-in-law Jai Singh, her husband Gurbaksh Singh having been killed earlier in a battle with the Ramgarhia misl in February 1785 when she was twenty-two. />
  Most accounts agree that when Ranjit Singh’s mother Raj Kaur went to the Hindu shrine of Jawalamukhi in the hilly region of Kangra to pray for the recovery of her son, Sada Kaur followed and persuaded her to agree to the marriage of her daughter with Ranjit Singh. After the boy’s recovery his father organized a grand feast at Gujranwala to which Mehtab Kaur’s grandfather, Jai Singh Kanhayia, the misl chief, was also invited. It was on this occasion that he formally asked Mahan Singh for his son Ranjit Singh’s hand in marriage to his granddaughter. The betrothal and marriage were, as was to be expected, celebrated on a spectacular scale.

  The special nature of the boy may be grasped from the fact that within three years of his attack of smallpox he took over the siege of Sodhran, in 1789 at the age of nine, when his father was suddenly stricken by a serious illness. It was an amazingly young age to take on such a task, even in a period when major responsibility could often come considerably sooner than in modern times. The town of Sodhran, lying some twenty-five miles southeast of Gujranwala, belonged to the Bhangi chief’s son Sahib Singh, Mahan Singh’s brother-in-law. In an engagement typical of the time Mahan Singh laid siege to it after Sahib Singh had refused to pay him tribute in acknowledgement of his suzerainty. The Bhangi misl chieftains, seeing in Mahan Singh’s illness an opportune moment to help their besieged kin in Sodhran, headed for the town in force in order to annex it permanently. But they were ambushed and decisively defeated by young Ranjit Singh’s quick thinking and actions which would become characteristic of him throughout his life. His father did not live to see his son’s Sodhran victory over the Bhangis; by the time he arrived back in Gujranwala Mahan Singh was already dead.

  In a brief pagri- or turban-tying ceremony, Ranjit Singh became the chief of the Sukerchakia misl. ‘When he first stood in his father’s place,’ wrote a British author nearer to Ranjit Singh’s time than our own, ‘everything was against him. He was beset by enemies, by doubtful friends, false allies and open foes.’6 Yet he overcame them all with an unflinching sense of purpose which again became evident within a year of his father’s death, in April 1790. Resolved to put an end to his new young rival, Hashmat Khan of the Chathas, smarting from the defeats his misl had suffered at Mahan Singh’s hands, waylaid young Ranjit Singh when he was out hunting and made a slash at him with his sword, which was deftly evaded. Ranjit Singh’s return blow proved fatal for Hashmat Khan.

  There was no set pattern to Ranjit Singh’s life during the years in which he grew to adulthood. His time was almost entirely taken up not with the customary occupations of boyhood but with military campaigns, which left him with no option but to be on horseback most of the time, often covering over fifty miles a day in the saddle. During these years of unending battles, which ranged from taking some of the Sikh misl chiefs head-on to warring with India’s Muslim rulers in addition to the Pathans, Afghans and other invaders who had always considered India fair game, his headquarters were at Gujranwala Fort.

  There is a story of Ranjit Singh’s mother, Raj Kaur, asking him to be wary as their enemies were trying to snatch away their lands. His reassuring reply was: ‘Don’t be impatient, Mother, I shall not only take back my own lands but will also finish off the intruders.’7

  The notorious Afghan Ahmed Shah Abdali, founder of the Durrani dynasty, had repeatedly ransacked India before Ranjit Singh’s time, but his grandson Zaman Shah was no less enthusiastic in pillaging and plundering India and even had an ambitious plan to found an Indian empire. The Afghans had long been held in considerable awe on the subcontinent. Ranjit Singh’s first brush with Zaman Shah’s army occurred when he invaded India for the second time in 1795; the first had been in 1793. In December 1795 Zaman Shah headed for Hasan Abdal, a place which, as Panja Sahib, has hallowed memories for the Sikhs since Guru Nanak sojourned there in the late fifteenth century. While Zaman stayed behind in Hasan Abdal, his general Ahmad Khan Shahanchibashi marched from Attock on the River Indus 200 miles to the town of Rohtas, which belonged to Ranjit Singh.

  To confuse Zaman and draw his force from its base in Hasan Abdal, Ranjit Singh withdrew his men from Rohtas to Pind Dadan Khan in the salt ranges. When the Afghans attacked Ranjit Singh he crossed the River Jhelum, reassembled on its southern bank and sent his messengers to the regional Maratha chief, Daulat Rao Sindhia, at Aligarh, inviting him to join the Sikhs and expel the Afghan invader. There was, however, no response from the Maratha chief.

  As fate would have it, Zaman had to return home in a hurry on hearing news of a revolt at Herat, but he was back again by October 1796, for the third time, camping in Peshawar for a month. Ranjit Singh’s rapid manoeuvres once again had the Afghans baffled. He established himself with a force of 10,000 men across the Jhelum not far from Peshawar, then moved to Pind Dadan Khan, then on to Miani, then suddenly crossed the Jhelum for a surprise attack on the Durranis at Pind Dadan Khan before recrossing the river once again. At this point Zaman Shah addressed a letter to Ranjit Singh asking him to desist from opposing him. Ranjit Singh’s reply is celebrated. ‘Through the grace of the Guru every Sikh is bound to be victorious.’8

  Still on his third invasion, Zaman Shah entered Lahore in January 1797 with a formidable force. Lahore had been officially made an Afghan province in 1752 after the Abdalis had wrested it from the Mughals. Zaman did not want to waste time in Lahore because he was keen to reach Amritsar to settle the Sikh problem once and for all. Ranjit Singh could barely wait to take him on. When a detachment of the Afghan army first took the offensive and attacked Amritsar on 11 January 1797 it suffered a humiliating defeat with much loss of blood. A furious Zaman Shah, beside himself with rage, now took personal command and arrived in Amritsar the next day. He, too, was not only vanquished but was chased all the way to the gates of Lahore by the Sikh army.

  To make certain that the Durrani hordes would never again set foot in India, Ranjit Singh invited Sahib Singh to join him in expelling him. Sahib Singh was chief of the Phulkian misl, whose great-grandfather, Ala Singh, had been made Raja of Patiala by Ahmed Shah Abdali during a previous invasion of India in 1763, the same Abdali who a year before that had blown the Harmandir Sahib apart, filled the sacred pool with human bodies and carcasses of cows, killed thousands of pilgrims and made a pyramid of Sikh heads on the site. Not surprisingly, Ranjit Singh received no reply from Sahib Singh. Most of what the Patiala family owned had come to it through Abdali’s largesse.

  Zaman Shah, still smarting from his defeat at the gates of Amritsar, left Lahore in February 1797 for Peshawar en route for Afghanistan. His general Ahmad Khan Shahanchibashi, left behind at Rohtas to take care of the Sikhs, was finished off there on 29 April 1797. With India still very much on his mind, Zaman launched his last invasion in September 1798, eager to drive the Sikhs out of Punjab and put a decisive end to Ranjit Singh’s power. The various battles and skirmishes that took place during this visit took him no further towards ending Sikh power, and when he received news from Afghanistan of a serious threat to his throne in Kabul he hastened back to his capital. Taking advantage of his absence, the Iranians had invaded Khorasan in Afghanistan and were making their way to Kabul. In his precipitate departure, Zaman lost twelve of his prized cannon in the Jhelum river which was in spate. The loss of these guns in fact proved a turning point in his relations with Ranjit Singh who, on receiving an urgent plea for his help in retrieving the guns, magnanimously complied. Zaman Shah then assured Ranjit Singh that he would not oppose his taking over Lahore.

  On returning home, Zaman Shah was soon in the thick of rampant court intrigues and fateful events which will be related later.

  It may be asked at this point what help and guidance was available to Ranjit Singh during his formative years, who was close to him and may have influenced him. One friend in particular deserves mention: Gurmukh Singh, eight years older than Ranjit Singh, who came into the family around the time Ranjit was born. The story goes that ‘In the summer of 1780, as Sardar Mahan Singh was passing through the little town of Kheora
on his return from an expedition in the neighbourhood of Pind Dadan Khan, Gurmukh Singh, then a boy of eight years, was presented to him by his uncle Basti Ram, the Toshakhania [Treasurer]. The Sardar was pleased with the bright eyes and intelligent looks of the boy and kept him with himself. Later in the same year Ranjit Singh was born, and Gurmukh was appointed his companion.’9 An enduring friendship developed between Ranjit Singh and Gurmukh Singh, who was to be by his side when he captured Lahore in 1799. Because of his trust in him the Sukerchakia chief not only put him in charge of all the treasures of Lahore that fell into his hands but made him paymaster of his victorious army.

  Ranjit Singh’s learning of Gurmukhi and his grounding in the beliefs, ethics and tenets of the Sikh faith at a very early age played a key role in the shaping of his humane character and of the state’s even-handed policies under his rule. The extent of his commitment from a very young age to secular ideals, that is, his open-mindedness to other religions and cultures besides his own,10 is borne out by the fact that while he loved composing verses in Punjabi, which was an integral part of his being, he made Persian the official language of the Lahore Durbar. Although he did not know it at this age – the only other language he knew besides his own was Gurmukhi – he was as attracted to Persian as he was to Urdu, Kashmiri, Sindhi and many other regional languages.

  While there is no denying his fascination throughout his early years with horsemanship, hunting, shooting and swordsmanship, another side of him drew inspiration from the spiritual under-pinnings of his faith; an inspiration that could have come only from the environment of the household in which he grew up. He was, after all, a great-great-grandson of the legendary Desu (Budha Singh), who had gone to Guru Gobind Singh at the age of fifty to be baptized into the Khalsa at Anandpur and who had died at Gurdas Nangal in 1715 fighting by the side of Banda Singh Bahadur. There can be little doubt that having the blood of this larger-than-life figure in his veins must have been more influential in shaping his leaderly qualities than any formal education could have been and that in his formative years there was more going for him than even he could have realized.