Mughal Emperors - Sikhs

Sikhs

The Afghan defeat of the Maratha armies accelerated the breakaway of Punjab from Delhi and helped the founding of Sikh overlordship in the northwest. Rooted in the bhakti movements that developed in the 2nd century BC. but swept across North India during the 15th and 16th centuries, the teachings of the Sikh gurus appealed to the hard-working peasants. Facing extended persecution from the Mughals, the Sikhs, under Guru Gobind Singh formed the Khalsa (Army of Pure). The khalsa rose up against the economic and political repressions in Punjab toward the end of Aurangzeb's rule. Guerrilla fighters took advantage of the political instability created by the Persian and Afghan onslaught against Delhi, enriching themselves and expanding territorial control. By the 1770s, Sikh hegemony extended from the Indus in the west to the Yamuna in the east, from Multan in the south to Jammu in the north. Jassa Singh Ahluwahlia entered Delhi with a large Sikh army in 1776, established hegemony, but then decided unilaterally to return to Punjab.

The Sikhs, however, were a loose and disunited conglomerate of twelve kin-groups. Ultimately, Ranjit Singh was able to unite these groups by force, and start Sikh rule that would extend from Afghanistan to the River Sutlej, and from Kashmir and Ladakh to the borders of Sindh. Ranjit Singh employed French and British officers and introduced strict military discipline into his army. It is said that his guns were cast with the utmost of excellence and quality, in that they were superior to any that the British had at the time. Further fired by the prayers of the Sikh Dharma, the Sikhs became a potent power in North-west India, plugging the Khyber pass from which numerous invasions had been launched into India, including by Alexander the Great, Chengiz Khan the Mongol nomad, Nader Shah the Persian king, and Mahmud Ghazni and Ahmad Shah Abdali the Afghans.

Ranjit Singh wrested Kashmir from Afghan rule after the Afghans backtracked on fulfilling their part of the promise for the conquest of Kashmir for which Ranjit Singh committed troops from the outside in the form of assistance, for which he was to be paid a certain sum from the Kashmir treasury. But, the ruler of Afghan instructed his brother, Dost Muhamed, the new Governor of Kashmir, to withhold payment to Ranjit Singh. At that insult, Ranjit Singh quietly withdrew his troops, and ambushed near Khyber pass the whole Afghan army returning from Kashmir. Only six people managed to escape that ambush—the ruler of Afghanistan, his brother, and four others—who ran from battle, leaving their army to be slaughtered by the Sikhs.