Maharaja Ranjit Singh

Ranjit Singh unified the Sikh empire by overpowering the feuding Misls (confederacies).
He is known for his accomplishment in liberating Lahore (his capital) from Afghan invaders, and subsequently he was given the title Lion of Punjab (Sher-e-Punjab).
The erstwhile Mughal provinces of Lahore and Multan, as well as a portion of Kabul and all of Peshawar, were all part of Ranjit Singh’s trans-regional empire (which spanned multiple kingdoms).
His state’s boundaries extended from Ladakh in the northeast to the Khyber Pass (the path used by foreign monarchs to attack India) in the northwest, and from Panjnad in the south to the Indus, where the five rivers of Punjab met (The five rivers are the Beas, Ravi, Sutlej, Chenab and Jhelum, all of which are tributaries of the river Indus).

Ranjit Singh was known for governing in a just and secular manner.
In his darbar, both Hindus and Muslims were granted significant positions.
By coating Harimandir Sahib in Amritsar in gold, he transformed it into the Golden Temple.
He is also credited with establishing the Hazoor Sahib gurudwara at Nanded, Maharashtra, where Guru Gobind Singh is buried.
He possessed the Koh-i-Noor diamond from Shuja Shah Durrani of Afghanistan, which he left to Jagannath Temple in Puri, Odisha.
He merged the traditional Khalsa army with modern military innovations. Maharaja Ranjit Singh allowed men from different religions and races to serve in his army and his government in various positions of authority. He also used a huge number of European officers to teach his forces, particularly French officers. He assigned the task of modernising his army to French General Jean Franquis Allard.

It was a treaty struck between Charles T. Metcalfe, who represented the British East India Company, and Ranjit Singh.
The immediate reason for the treaty was Napoleon’s Treaty of Tilsit with Russia (1807) and Ranjit’s attempt to put the Cis-Sutlej states under his rule. The British want a defensive treaty against France, as well as control over Punjab from the Sutlej River.
The border of Ranjit’s holdings was set largely along the line of the Sutlej River by the treaty.
- Although the terms of the treaty prevented Singh from any further territorial expansion south of the Sutlej, they also permitted him complete freedom of action to the north of it. This enabled him to extract tribute from less powerful chieftains, including Jats and other Sikhs, and ultimately to gain control of areas such as Peshawar and Kashmir. The unification of these territories, which was aided by him Westernising his armies, formed the Sikh empire that lasted until British subjugation in 1849.

A nine-foot-tall bronze statue of the first ruler of the Sikh Empire, Maharaja Ranjit Singh was vandalised at the Lahore Fort in Pakistan’s Punjab province.

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