हिंदीOn this day

The Sikh Empire (Sarkar-i-Khalsa)

Ranjit Singh took Lahore in 1799 and was proclaimed Maharaja of the Punjab in 1801. He united the Sikh misls into one state, pushed the Afghans back beyond the Khyber, and built the last great Indian army to face the British; ten years after his death the empire was annexed in 1849.

  1. Ranjit Singh1801–1839
  2. Kharak Singh1839–1840
  3. Nau Nihal Singh1840
  4. Chand Kaur (regent)1840–1841
  5. Sher Singh1841–1843
  6. Duleep Singh1843–1849
Period: 1799–1849 CERegion: The Punjab from the Sutlej to the Khyber, with Multan, Kashmir, Ladakh and PeshawarCapitals: Lahore
Photo: Unknown authorUnknown author · Public domain

01Lahore and the misls

Ranjit Singh was the son of the Sukerchakia misl chief Maha Singh, and lost the sight of one eye to smallpox as a child. He rode into Lahore on 7 July 1799, and on Baisakhi of 1801 was proclaimed Maharaja. Amritsar came under him in 1802. One by one the other misls were absorbed by war, marriage or purchase, though the chiefs south of the Sutlej went under British protection; the treaty of Amritsar with the East India Company in 1809 fixed that river as his border.

02Multan, Kashmir, Peshawar

Ranjit Singh took the Koh-i-Noor from the exiled Afghan king Shah Shuja in 1813. His armies captured Multan in 1818 and Kashmir in 1819, ending Afghan rule in the valley. Peshawar fell under Sikh control in the 1820s and was annexed outright in 1834. The general Hari Singh Nalwa held the frontier and built the fort at Jamrud, where he was killed in 1837 beating off an Afghan army. In the hills the Dogra feudatory Gulab Singh sent Zorawar Singh into Ladakh from 1834. The core of the army, the Fauj-i-Khas, was drilled on European lines by Ventura and Allard.

Amritsar
Place · Founded by Guru Ram Das, c. 1577AmritsarThe city of the pool of nectar, founded by the fourth Sikh Guru around the tank in which the Harmandir Sahib stands. Twice blown up by Ahmad Shah Abdali and twice rebuilt, it is the heart of the Sikh faith, the Dharmic sibling of the Hindus.Read →

03The court after Ranjit Singh

Ranjit Singh died in Lahore on 27 June 1839. Within six years his son Kharak Singh, grandson Nau Nihal Singh, son Sher Singh and the Dogra minister Dhian Singh were all dead, by illness, a falling gateway or murder, and the army’s panchayats came to rule the court. In the name of the child Duleep Singh, with his mother Jind Kaur as regent, the Khalsa army crossed the Sutlej in December 1845. It lost at Mudki, Ferozeshah, Aliwal and Sobraon, and the treaty of Lahore in 1846 took the Jalandhar doab; Kashmir was sold to Gulab Singh.

04Annexation, 1849

The revolt at Multan in 1848 became the second Anglo-Sikh war. The Sikhs fought the British to a standstill at Chillianwala in January 1849 but lost at Gujrat in February, and on 29 March 1849 the Punjab was annexed. Duleep Singh, eleven years old, was sent away to England, and the Koh-i-Noor went to Queen Victoria. The Samadhi of Ranjit Singh beside the Lahore fort, where four ranis and seven maidservants became sati on his pyre, was finished in 1848.

Kashi Vishwanath
Place · Present temple 1780, Ahilyabai Holkar; gold on the spires 1835, Maharaja Ranjit SinghKashi VishwanathThe Jyotirlinga of Kashi, the city Shiva never leaves, where death on the ghats is said to bring moksha. The temple was destroyed in 1194 and 1669 and stands today beside the mosque built on its old plinth.Read →

The rulers

  1. 1Ranjit SinghTook Lahore 1799; Maharaja from 18011801–1839
  2. 2Kharak Singh1839–1840
  3. 3Nau Nihal SinghKilled by a falling gateway1840
  4. 4Chand Kaur (regent)1840–1841
  5. 5Sher SinghAssassinated1841–1843
  6. 6Duleep SinghLast Maharaja; Jind Kaur regent1843–1849

What they left

  • The gilded Harmandir Sahib, Amritsar
  • Gold plating on the spire of Kashi Vishwanath
  • The end of Afghan rule in Kashmir and Peshawar
  • The Samadhi of Ranjit Singh, Lahore

People

Maharaja Ranjit SinghRuler
1780–1839 CE; Maharaja 1801–1839

Maharaja Ranjit Singh

Founder of the Sikh empire

Zorawar Singh KahluriaWarrior
1784–1841 CE

Zorawar Singh Kahluria

Dogra general who won Ladakh and Baltistan

Hari Singh NalwaWarrior
1791–1837 CE

Hari Singh Nalwa

Sikh general who held the Khyber

Places

AmritsarRebuilt
The Mughal era and the resistance

Amritsar

The city of the pool of nectar, founded by the fourth Sikh Guru around the tank in which the Harmandir Sahib stands. Twice blown up by Ahmad Shah Abdali and twice rebuilt, it is the heart of the Sikh faith, the Dharmic sibling of the Hindus.

Sri Harmandir Sahib, AmritsarRebuilt
The Mughal era and the resistance

Sri Harmandir Sahib, Amritsar

The holiest gurdwara of the Sikhs, set in the Amrit Sarovar dug by Guru Ram Das, where Guru Arjan Dev installed the Adi Granth in 1604. Afghan armies desecrated and blew it up in the 18th century; the Khalsa rebuilt it each time.

Kashi VishwanathRebuilt
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Kashi Vishwanath

The Jyotirlinga of Kashi, the city Shiva never leaves, where death on the ghats is said to bring moksha. The temple was destroyed in 1194 and 1669 and stands today beside the mosque built on its old plinth.

GujranwalaStanding
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Gujranwala

The town north of Lahore where the Sukerchakia chiefs built their fort, where Maharaja Ranjit Singh was born on 13 November 1780 and Hari Singh Nalwa in 1791. Its Hindu and Sikh people left at Partition in 1947.

Lahore (Lavapura)Standing
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Lahore (Lavapura)

The old capital of Punjab on the Ravi, part of the Hindu Shahi realm until Mahmud’s conquest, and from 1799 to 1849 the capital of Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s Sikh empire. At Partition in 1947 nearly all its Hindus and Sikhs had to leave.

HaripurStanding
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Haripur

The town Hari Singh Nalwa founded in 1822 when Ranjit Singh made him governor of Hazara, with a fort to hold the hill country between the Indus and Kashmir. It was the headquarters of Hazara until the British took the Punjab.

Jamrud Fort (Fatehgarh)Standing
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Jamrud Fort (Fatehgarh)

The fort Hari Singh Nalwa built in 54 days at the mouth of the Khyber Pass in 1836, the farthest western bastion of the Sikh empire. He fell defending it against the Afghans on 30 April 1837.

Battles

Battle of Jamrud

Dost Mohammad Khan sent his army down the Khyber to retake Peshawar; Hari Singh Nalwa, the Sikh governor of the frontier, rode out from Peshawar to relieve the besieged fort of Jamrud and died there.

30 April 1837

Zorawar Singh’s Tibet Campaign

The general who had already won Ladakh and Baltistan for Raja Gulab Singh led his army over the high passes into western Tibet, near Kailash and Mansarovar, and fell there in the snow.

May–December 1841

First Anglo-Sikh War

Six years after Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s death the Khalsa army crossed the Sutlej and fought the Company in four hard battles, let down, many held then and since, by its own commanders.

December 1845 – February 1846

Second Anglo-Sikh War

A rising at Multan in April 1848 grew into a second war; at Chillianwala the Khalsa gave the Company one of its bloodiest days in India, but Gujrat ended the Sikh empire.

April 1848 – March 1849

On the timeline

  • 5 February 1762

    Vadda Ghallughara: the great Sikh massacreResistance

    Abdali surprises a Sikh column with its families near Kup, by Malerkotla, and many thousands are killed in a single day. In April he blows up the Harmandir Sahib; the Sikhs rebuild it and within two years take Sirhind and Lahore.

  • July 1819

    Ranjit Singh takes KashmirPolity

    The Sikh army defeats the Afghan governor at Shopian and ends nearly five centuries of rule by sultans and Afghans in the valley.

  • 29 March 1849

    Punjab annexedPolity

    After the second Anglo-Sikh war Lord Dalhousie annexes Punjab. The boy Maharaja Duleep Singh is sent away and the Koh-i-Noor goes to Queen Victoria.