RANJIT SINGH, MAHARAJA (1780-1839), native Indian ruler, was born on Nov. 2, 178o, the son of Sirdar Mahan Singh, whom he succeeded in 1792 as head of the Sukarchakia branch of the Sikh confederacy. By birth he was only one of many Sikh barons and owed his rapid rise entirely to force of character and will. At the age of 20 he obtained from Zaman Shah, the king of Afghanistan, a grant of Lahore, which he seized by force of arms in 1799. Subsequently he attacked and annexed Amritsar in 18o2, thus becoming master of the two Sikh capitals. When Jaswant Rao Holkar took refuge in the Punjab in 1805, Ranjit Singh made a treaty with the British, excluding Holkar from his territory. Shortly afterwards acute difficulties arose between him and the British as to the Cis-Sutlej portion of the Punjab. •It was Ranjit Singh's ambition to weld the whole of the Punjab into a single Sikh empire, while the British claimed the territory south of the Sutlej by right of conquest from the Mahrattas. The difference proceeded almost to the point of war; but at the last moment Ranjit Singh yielded. In 1808 Charles Metcalfe was sent to settle this question with Ranjit Singh, and a treaty was con cluded at Amritsar on April 15, 1809.
The Maharajah organized a powerful force, which was trained by French and Italian officers such as Generals Ventura, Allard and Avitabile, and thus forged the formidable fighting instru ment of the Khalsa army, which afterwards gave the British their hardest battles in India in the two Sikh wars. In 1810 he captured Multan after many assaults and a long siege, and in 182o had consolidated the whole of the Punjab between the Sutlej and the Indus under his dominion. In 1823 the city and province of Peshawar became tributary to him. In 1833 when Shah Shuja, flying from Afghanistan, sought refuge at his court, he took from him the Koh-i-noor diamond, which subsequently came into the possession of the British crown. Though he dis approved of Lord Auckland's policy of substituting Shah Shuja for Dost Mohamed, he loyally supported the British in their advance on Afghanistan. He was known as "The Lion of the Punjab." Ranjit Singh died of paralysis on June 27, 1839. (See also PUNJAB: History.) See Sir Lepel Griffin, Ranjit Singh (Rulers of India Series), 1892; General Sir J ohn Gordon, The Sikhs, 1904 ; and S. S. Thorburn, The Punjab in Peace and War, 1904.