HARKING BACK: Lahore’s Muslim traders and Ranjit Singh victory

We read every day about the fall of Lahore to the Sikhs, yet very few realise that had this not happened the Lahore of old would not be the great city that it became. Let us go back to the autumn of 1796 when for the third time Ahmed Shah Zaman crossed the Indus heading for Delhi. The Afghan intention was, as it always has been, to loot and possess whatever they can snatch. The only Muslim to support Shah Zaman was, again of Afghan origin, the ruler of Kasur, Nizamuddin Khan. They still are known as Kasuris. The other traitors to the cause of the Punjab was the ruler of Patiala, whom like the Kasuris have supported every invader.

Shah Zaman used to brag that “where Afghan horses tread the grass never grows again”. The arrival of the Afghans sent all the Sikh Misls fleeing to the hills to the north. Only two ‘misls’ remained, they being the Sukerchakria and the Bhangis. They both rushed to Amritsar and urged the Sikh chiefs to unite and follow a new strategy. They would watch in very small groups of ten horsemen, and after the loot had been completed they would attack unrelentingly day and night till they crossed the Indus at Attock. This was the only way to completely destroy the invader.

But Ranjit Singh insisted that while the hit-and-run strategy would certainly work as it has in the past, but Lahore he would surround himself and clear the countryside around the city. The Bhangis refused to fight a static battle. So while he surrounded Lahore the remaining formed into smaller bands, hundreds of them all the way to the Indus. So one ‘static’ battleground was agreed and the remaining force would be fluid.

Every night Ranjit Singh would attack Afghan forces at Lahore and burnt all crops for ten miles around. The invaders started starving and sniper fire at night kept them on edge. As no new assistance was possible or able to get out of the siege, by January 1797 the Afghans were desperate and to add to their troubles Shah Zaman’s brother was rising in rebellion in Kabul. Shahanchi Khan was made Governor of Lahore and as Zaman headed for Kabul the Sikh horsemen decimated his force. In Lahore and throughout India the 18-year old Ranjit Singh was seen as the new saviour of the people.

The next year Shah Zaman returned with the vengeance. On his arrival Ranjit Singh and Sahib Singh Bhangi withdrew to Amritsar to organise, but before they could return Shah Zaman moved swiftly and took Gujrat and massacred its inhabitants. Amazingly, the Sikh and Hindus had evacuated. So the Muslims were decimated by the Afghans. They moved to Gujranwala where again the Punjabi Muslims were completely destroyed.

What was amazing was that this time the Afghans, all Muslims, were targeting the Muslims of the Punjab. What today seems shocking is that Nizamuddin Khan Kasuri sided with the invader and attacked the forces of Ranjit Singh at Shahdara, where the Sikhs defeated them soundly. Shah Zaman sent reinforcements but the Sikhs melted away. Shahdara was burnt to the ground and all its Muslim inhabitants killed. On the 27th of November, 1798, Shah Zaman entered Lahore, where the Muslims thought, and rightly so, that they would be killed. The Kasuris made the most of this opportunity.

Shah Zaman moved towards Amritsar and just a few miles outside Lahore lay in wait for Ranjit Singh and his Sukharchakia Misl. For him Lahore was important. He rushed the Afghans and decimated them, who fled towards Lahore and found safety within its walls. Again all crops were burnt and a new siege was laid. The starving Afghans and their king were desperate. In Kabul his brother was again stirring up trouble. Within the city the Muslim traders contacted Ranjit Singh, whose forces kept up gunfire all day and night. Shah Zaman and his Afghan horsemen decided to flee, chased up to the Indus by the Sikh. When they crossed over they had virtually nothing left. Even their cannons fell in the river on the way, one of which stands outside the Lahore Museum today.

Ranjit Singh quickly retook Gujranwala his hometown. In his absence three Sikh Sardars, who took possession every time the Afghans left, they being Chet Singh, Sahib Singh and Mohar Singh, took over Lahore and unleashed a reign of terror. At this point the Muslim traders of Lahore sent desperate messages to Ranjit Singh. The young commander returned and surrounded Lahore. He stationed himself in the beautiful ‘baradari’ of Wazir Khan behind the Lahore Museum. Then with the active assistance of the Muslims of Lahore the first breach was made.

Suddenly the traders threw open all the gates of the walled city open and the same day, on July 7, 1799, the gates of the Lahore Fort were thrown open and an 18-year old conqueror of Lahore, the first Punjabi since Mahmud of Ghazni in 1021, entered the city. He was to bring to great fame and glory to Lahore. A royal salute of cannons followed and the entire population burst into slogans and applause the like of which have never been seen since.

But this was just the beginning. Jealous chiefs of other ‘misls’ set to conspire and the young one-eyed and pock-marked chieftain from Gujranwala set about defeating them one by one. He proved a crafty and able ruler. As a shrewd gesture he returned to Shah Zaman 15 artillery pieces his forces had abandoned in their flight. The evil Nizamuddin Khan Kasuri tried to bring together Sikhs opposed to the man from ‘Sukher Chak’, but only to be crushed. The battle of Bhasin, ten miles from Lahore, made short work of these rebels. Now Ranjit was a force to be reckoned with.

He bestowed on himself the title of Maharajah and soon the British and the invading Afghans under Shah Zaman recognised his rule. He was a man who did not derive his power from recognition by Mughals, or Afghans or faraway Ottomans, but from his own Punjabi people.

On being crowned a ‘maharajah’ the very first order was to rebuild the walls of the old city and the Lahore Fort, around both he got a deep moat dug and at a distance a set of obstructing mud obstacles. All the gateways were restored and crime was crushed. The first visit outside the fort by Ranjit Singh was to the Badshahi Mosque and the Wazir Khan Mosque.

So it was that Maharajah Ranjit Singh conquered Lahore by conquering the hearts and minds of the Muslims first, who had suffered the most at the hands of the looting Afghans. Today we should learn a lot of lessons from past behaviour of foreign invaders. For the people of Lahore the grass certainly did grow, and grow densely, where Afghan horses once tread.