Dan Snow's History Hit - The Sikh Empire

Episode Date: September 12, 2020

Priya Atwal joined me on the pod to discuss the Sikh Empire, which stretched throughout northwestern India into Afghanistan and Tibet. We discuss the story of this empire’s spectacular rise and fall.Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got weekly quizzes where you can win prizes, and exclusive subscriber only articles. It's the ultimate history package. Just go to historyhit.tv to subscribe. Use code 'pod1' at checkout for your first month free and the following month for just £/€/$1.

Hello everyone, welcome to Dan Snow's History Hit. I've got a treat for you today. We've got more Indian history, history from the subcontinent. We've got Priya Atwal talking about the Sikh Empire, the rise of the remarkable Sikh Empire. In the 18th century, ever since the death of the mighty Aurangzeb, the Mughal Emperor, India was fragmenting. Just as the British were establishing their enclaves and moving inland to places in Maharashtra and Bengal, their enclaves and moving inland places in Maharashtra and Bengal. So too was a new empire being carved out of northwest India, the Sikh Empire. Priya Atwal has been on the podcast before. She's a legend. She is a historian and writer based in the UK. She has just written a wonderful new book on the Sikh Empire. And she's here to talk all about it. If you want to hear Priya's last interview on this podcast, if you want to hear all our back catalogue of podcasts,

please go to History Hit TV. It's like a history channel, really. And you can use the code POD1 when you check out P-O-D-1. You get a month for free and one month for just one pound, euro or dollar. Then you'll be a subscriber. You'll be supporting everything we're doing here at History Hit. This week, we're reuniting a man with the aircraft of his father. His father flew in the Second World War. His father was killed during the Second World War. The aircraft survives. We've discovered it exists. We are reuniting a gentleman with his father's aircraft. He has not seen it. He does not know it still exists. And 75 years on, we're going to reunite them. That's all thanks to you. That's all thanks to you subscribers

for supporting everything we're doing. So thank you again. In the meantime, everyone, here's Priya Atwal. Enjoy. Priya, great to have you back on the podcast. Thanks for having me back, Dan. We always hear about the fading Mughal Empire in relation to the arrival of the British, but actually there was more going on on the old subcontinent. Who else was taking advantage of the lessening power of Delhi? Well, I think you could say that every man and his wife and dog was taking advantage across

India at this stage as the Mughal Imperium was starting to crumble. And I mean, I'm talking about the 18th century at this point. And it's interesting because in a lot of British colonial historiography, you tend to see this period described as one of just utter chaos. And that the British come into and the East India Company comes in to impose some sort of order on all of this, right, and restore the glory of the Mughals. But of course, there's actually so much going on from Tipu Sultan to Maharaja Ranjit Singh and the Begums of Bhopal and other than others. There are so many new players that enter the region and establish their own kingdoms and courts and powerful armies at this time. Where are we talking about? To northern northwest India, aren't we, and Afghanistan? So orientate ourselves there. And also, what had been the relationship of the Sikh Empire with the Mughal power at its peak? So, well, the Sikh Empire really emerges after the Mughals have

lost control of the Punjab and northern India. It's the Sikh missiles, the kind of warrior bands that emerge after the death or soon after the death of Guru Gobind Singh, the last Sikh guru. And they are the ones that really take on the remnants of Mughal power in the Punjab and crush it, as well as Afghan invasions that are coming from Central Asia to dominate the region of the Punjab, which is an incredibly fertile, lucrative part of northern India. And essentially, the Sikh kind of, these little tiny warrior bands that start off as almost, you know, running a kind of guerrilla warfare tiny warrior bands that start off as almost you know running a kind of guerrilla warfare against the Mughal administration and also the Hindu

princely states that are the small hill states that are in the Punjab hills um they the Sikhs take them on and they try to establish a much more egalitarian religiously based society essentially uh but those those missiles those warrior bands themselves over the course of the 18th century emerge as mini royal powers they they slowly slowly transition away from being quite meritocratic and kind of hardy little warrior groups to slowly slowly becoming more refined and royal in their culture with their leaders their chiefs and that kind of thing and then essentially you see these Sikh figures starting to adapt and adopt the older Mughal ruling culture and the older Rajput ruling culture and essentially setting themselves up as mini kings. And from there, you see the young

Ranjit Singh emerge, who wants to combine all of the territories and powers of these former missiles and set up an empire. And why do the Mughals lose control of Punjab? Is it because of Sikh power and Afghan power? Is it a push or a pull? Oh, in a way, it's many factors over the course of about a good century or so. But it's yes, it's the Sikhs, it's the Afghans, and also other local kind of more nomadic tribal warrior groups like the Rahillas and the Gujjars. And I guess you could say the Maratha Empire as well.

All of these groups, big and small, they're all pushing and pulling at the fabric of Mughal power. And essentially it just rips apart. The Afghans come in and just knock them out with massive sucker punches every few years. And then the Sikhs are kind of chipping away on the ground, if you see what I mean. And then when you add in the Maratha empire that sucks out the resources across the rest of Northern India and takes control, the Mughals just aren't left with much to ground to stand on, essentially. But I must admit, their symbolic and their cultural power lives on. And that does continue to influence Sikh conceptions of politics as well.

Sikh gurus engage with this. They don't directly rubbish it or throw it away. They engage with it and they subvert it in their own political culture. So it's very much there. Now, Sikhism is a religion. Is it quite ethnically Punjabi? Was there an ethnic dimension to this empire building or or were they happy to make converts wherever they found them it's a bit of

both actually um it's definitely i mean it grows out of you know the the secret seekers in the cradle of it is the punjab and you definitely see that the local culture influences the more sort of martial aspects of the faith as it develops you know against mughal power into the sort of beginning of the 18th century um with the the creation of the karsa the military sort of warrior warrior brotherhood that the last guru gaurvan singh sets up um but at the same time as you as you kind of get into the politics of how this empire is built and the the real importance of kinship networks to bring together different Sikh chiefs, Sardars as they were known, and kind of get them to encourage them to work as allies and as kind of military comrades in a way. They rely on this idea of kinship that's very prevalent

within Punjabi and Northern Indian culture, that you treat each other as brothers, you treat each other as equals, brothers in arms in a way, essentially. And that really shapes the culture that Ranjit Singh then builds upon to turn his missile into a dynasty, and to then establish the kind of relational groups that help him rise to power as a new Maharaja. And is there tension within Sikhism as it transitions from a kind of religious idea and religious practice into an imperial structure? Well, it's interesting that it's not Sikhism that's transitioning in this sense. It's how different interpretations of these, you know, of these royal figures or these newly emergent royal figures, how they interpret the legacy of what their faith and their history has left them to give them a new political mileage to claim royal power. And I mean, I think we're still, Sikh historians in particular, are still trying to grapple with what the political legacy of the gurus were. And, you know, there's a debate that I touched upon in the book that the 18th century

period, should Sikhs have created some sort sort of republic would that have been a closer you know cut to the to the ideals of the gurus and and the very um egalitarian radically egalitarian vision that they were setting up or was this sort of really enlightened type of monarchy actually the way to go right and and the idea of a really humble king who would lead his or her servants to greatness in a way, and moral greatness as well as, you know, prosperity within society, that would enable Sikhs to rule over a diverse population as well. We can't forget that Sikhs were actually minority in the Punjab at this time, the Hindus and Muslims were in a much greater majority. So what does that mean as well to establish Sikh rule over such a diverse population?

It's a complicated factor. They were definitely willing to and encouraging more people to convert into the Sikh faith. But at the same time, it's not necessarily a proselytizing religion in a direct sense. It was just thought that, you know, the ethics of it would draw people in, the egalitarianism of it would draw people in. And it does. It drives people in in droves. But at the same time, I guess the politics and the philosophy of rulership, we're still understanding what that would have looked like. And what's clear when you look back at this period of history is that Sikhs themselves were very much experimenting with all sorts of different ideas of political formations and how to make their society work. You know, once they've got rid of Mughal rule

and they're trying to set themselves up themselves, there's all sorts of ideas being thrown around, essentially. And so now let's get on to the chronology. Tell me about this man, this individual, who really establishes this imperial dynasty, well, this empire and his dynasty. Maharaja Ranjit Singh was born in 1718 in Gujranwala, which is today in Pakistan. It was in the northwestern corner of the United Punjab at that time. And he's born as the sort of second or third generation of a young chief of what's known as the Sukhrajakia

Missal. So one of those warrior bands that we were talking about earlier. And there were 12 of them, Sikh-led warrior bands at that time, towards the end of the 18th century. And actually, Ranjitsin's family missile was one of the smallest. But they were quite mighty, I have to say. And because they were right on that northwestern fringe of Punjab, they were at the heart of fighting against the Afghans, dealing with those invading kind of Afghan Pathan clans and troops that were regularly crossing

back and forth in and out of the Punjab. And essentially, you know, his father and his grandfather had already built up quite a significant patch of territory that was quite lucrative. But this territory, remarkably, is so heterodox. It's a Sikh warrior caste ruling over Muslims, Hindus, no doubt a whole bunch of Afghan and other people. Do you think homogenous villages nearby the ones or completely intermixed within communities? You would have been very intermixed.

You would have had villages that were very intermixed with lots of different communities living side by side. But then you also would have had quite nomadic groups passing through as well, especially in the more hilly regions. So yes, absolutely. Mixes of different castes, different communities, people of different ethnic backgrounds. And essentially they would have been ruling over a cluster

of several of these types of villages. And sort of drawing... I mean, it's interesting as well in that these kind of Sikh chiefs at this time were kind of being exhorted by their community to recruit only Sikhs into their warrior forces. But at the same time, they were where they needed to or where they're available, picking up, you know, Muslims or Afghans from the pool of military labor that was available. So it's actually a very creative, very fluid time for these kinds of intercommunal relations. So go on.

So, OK, I interrupted you. So they're ruling over, it's very lucrative, they're making money. They're making money, what? Protection money, taxation in return for defending people against these many, many enemies. Absolutely. So the protection money was known as raki,

that the Sikh missile chiefs would collect, almost like a form of tribute, basically, from the local populations that they were effectively now ruling over as a form of tax. But then they would also raid and loot and pillage, you know, neighbouring territories that were held by enemy groups or whatever, and take wealth from them or essentially capture those villages so as i said it's a form of guerrilla warfare that they're engaging with at this stage but slowly slowly it becomes as their power expands particularly sukkah sukkah missile and others they start establishing a more settled form of administration rudimentary still but tapping into the old mughal administration at the very local level and setting up their own mini, mini, mini kingdoms that, you know, and then there's 12 of them, of course,

spread out across this region of northern India and Punjab. And so he would have just been a warrior from the cradle. I mean, it's just unbelievably able on the battlefield. Well, this is it. I mean, the story that his, later his Persian chronicler, Suhan al-Suri really captures is how at the age of 10, the young Ranjit Singh,

I mean, I think we have to add for a certain amount of romanticism, even at that time around him. But at the age of 10, he's recorded as having gone into battle when his father, Mahasin, falls sick. And how, you know, he's so brave and he doesn't

think about, he doesn't let himself get worried that his dad might not survive. He just goes into it and does his duty. And in the course of this battle, Mahasingh does die and Ranjit Singh inherits the chiefdom of the Sukhachakya Missal. And it's just this idea that, yes, he is the young born warrior and he's ready at the age of 10 to take on that responsibility. I mean, the mind boggles and somehow he survives and indeed thrives and welds this empire of all these disparate groups. Absolutely. And well, I think the thing we have to bear in mind is that although all of these 12 groups have got their own territorial patches, as it were, and they've got this very heterogeneous society that they're ruling over. And it's meant to be a part of a united whole, this idea of the Khalsa combined and establishing its rulership, its Raj over the Punjab. There was a lot of, you know, competition amongst them all and territory was constantly exchanging hands or being grabbed off

one another as well and so I mean Ranjit Singh's often credited with bringing order to this system and by establishing his rule across the whole of the Punjab by uniting it but of course there's a lot of politics within that in that how did he manage to establish his writ over everybody. And of course, it's incredible talent and grit and foresight, I think, to bring that level of control over the Punjab. But we have to ask questions, I think, of how did he do that and what tensions did it throw up in the process? And I've tried to then look at it holistically within the book because he could be a bit of a bully boy at times, I think,

but he was also definitely this hero of Punjab. So it's a very nuanced picture that I've tried to play with. Land a Viking longship on island shores, scramble over the dunes of ancient Egypt and avoid the Poisoner's Cup in Renaissance Florence. Each week on Echoes of History, we uncover the epic stories that inspire Assassin's Creed. We're stepping into feudal Japan in our special series Chasing Shadows, where samurai warlords and shinobi spies teach us the tactics and skills needed not only to survive, but to conquer.

Whether you're preparing for assassin's creed shadows or fascinated by history and great stories listen to echoes of history a ubisoft podcast brought to you by history hits there are new episodes every week well i'm sure i yeah i can imagine you're treading on eggshells. The other side, meanwhile, the other side of India and Bengal, you've got basically extreme violence, starvation and bribery working for the British over there as they're building their empire. I mean, are there any similarities between what's going on? Is it coincidental that these two, if you like, these two nascent empires are both building and growing at the same time on either sides of the subcontinent?

I think so. And I mean, I think it goes back to what we were saying at the start of this interview that, you know, that once the Mughal Imperium really starts to fall apart, there's so much opportunity up for grabs for such a diverse range of people. And we see that across the subcontinent at this time i mean we have to remember that the indian subcontinent is just vast and there's so many

um different regions localities with their own cultures and and and kind of melting pots of politics going on so um you know the east india company is its own disruptive force of course and the politics and the kind of economic style that it brings to bear is very different to what's going on in the Punjab and what Ranjit Singh is doing and the type of, I mean, we can call it colonialism that he is building, but it's of a very different nature

to what the East India Company is establishing. And are there any technological advantages? Why is he, I mean, basically, why is he able to weld this giant empire together? Is there something around the firepower revolution, modern technology, or is he just an extremely able conqueror and ruler? early adopter of a lot of key European military technology that's coming into play. I mean, there's lots of stories that we know about how Ranjit Singh sneaks into neighbouring camps along the Sutlej River of British supplies. And he, you know, supposedly goes in disguise to go and check out the latest cannons and guns and things like that that the British or the French or whoever else are trying to deploy in the field or he's got his intelligence spies that are going to these different courts or camps around Delhi to find out or are also consorting with the Marathas and that kind of stuff and he's keeping a close eye on this but he's not using he does to an extent

use that kind of weaponry within the Punjab for his campaigns. I mean, it's useful for him to capture really big forts like Gangra or regions of the Kashmir and to fight against the Afghans, for example, and to fully push the Afghans out of the region. But the other aspect of all of this is that he's just, and what I guess I've tried to focus on in the book more, is this idea of his dynastic colonialism. more is this idea of his dynastic colonialism, the way he really goes and takes that to another level, the ambition of taking over the Punjab and of really ramping up the networks that surround his warrior band, the Sukhajakiya Missal, in order to get rid of the one amongst equals ideal and really kind of subordinate that to his to his family and his clan and so you

know he goes on this almost this rampage of getting married across the Punjab he marries at least 30 women and then he then arranges for his sons to have multiple marriages as well and you might not think that that's actually a big deal but really it's a massive change from what the previous cohort of Sikh chiefs had done most of them had only married a couple of women of similar backgrounds. And they'd, you know, use those kind of allies and to build something new and build something that's much more dramatically imperial. Now, what is his attitude towards coming back to this idea of religion? He doesn't, he doesn't, Sikhism is not something that is imposed on these peoples that he's conquering, is it? No, it's not. peoples that he's conquering is that no it's not i mean he it's interesting that at the courtly level anyone that takes on a um a chief like a chief role as a kind of political ambassador or as a

general i mean he has all sorts of european generals joining his army from france and italy and even the us and he asks them all to wear to grow beards and wear turbans and that so to take on the outward appearance of a Sikh. But he doesn't forcibly encourage them or push them to convert or anything like that. So in a way, he maintains the fluidity of Punjabi society that even the gurus had, you know, allowed for really. But at the same time, and he very much, you know, patronizes all sorts of different religious societies and institutions throughout the kingdom. And of course, he marries Hindu and Muslim women, just as he marries Sikh women. So in the fold of his dynasty and of his court, it's actually very cosmopolitan.

But it is definitely infused with a Sikh religious identity. I mean, his government is known as the Sarkaria Khalsa, the government of the Khalsa. He doesn't mint coins in his own name or with his own image. He mints them with the names and the images of the gurus. So it's an interesting mix. He very much believes himself, and you can see he projects himself as being humble to the gurus and being humble to that Sikh inheritance that he's taken on from his ancestors and to rule in that name. But at the same time,

it's balanced with this idea of really hard power and in that kind of Mughal imperial style. It's so interesting, isn't it, that in the nationalism, the religious and ethnic nationalism that ripped across the world from the early 19th century onwards, you know, that eventually leads to the separation of India and Pakistan. The Sikh Empire doesn't kind of get a look in in that partition, I'm guessing, or does it? Because maybe, you know, he didn't create enough Sikhs for the kind of head counting nationalists of the 19th and 20th centuries to think it was a separate entity? Like did anyone ever suggest reviving the Sikh empire when they're talking about the partition of India in the 1940s? Yeah, they did. Or at least they wanted credit for it having existed. I mean, the thing is, is that there's so much internal debate, contestation amongst Sikhs in the 1940s about what they want,

you know, as a settlement from independent India and with the end of the British Raj. And in a way, it reflects the kind of messiness of the way that Sikhs spread throughout the Punjab from throughout the 19th century, from Manjeet Singh's time onwards. They're an incredibly prosperous community, you know, throughout this period, considering that they're a minority, um, but they are a minority, and, and the logic of population, majority-minority, that comes in from the late 19th century onwards is, is, um, is really the, the toxin at the heart of all of that debate and I guess I mean it's interesting because even Maharaja Ranjit Singh himself um as I said he kind of dabbled in a whole variety of religious

practices himself although he held himself up to be a Sikh king he would worship at Hindu temples he would celebrate Islamic festivals um alongside doing all of the Sikh, you know, kind of prayers and customs and all the rest of it. So him himself is a hybrid figure. And amongst Sikh scholars of the 20th century and politicians, it's interesting, because I mean, it's not just him as a Sikh king, but it's also as him as a king, right? So you see the rise of democracy in that period as well. So some people want to celebrate the fact that a Sikh empire existed, say hey we were great once and you need to remember that and and you know award us a fair settlement accordingly but at the same time Ranjit Singh himself takes on this kind of more complicated image because he was a monarch uh technically an autocrat and all this kind of

thing so we don't want to we want democracy as well right that's also the claim so it's it's a murky one it's a totally murky one um but i guess in some ways it's marshaled as a counterpose to the mughal demand for pakistan because they had a empire right so okay well it's it becomes about a tit-for- tat of history and population politics. And you lose all sense of nuance then, I think, which is a shame, because that was what that cultural fluency of that period was all about, really. I've interviewed many people about the partition. I always find the Sikh community's position in the violence around the partition just so extraordinary because they're this sort of forgotten minority

in the struggle that everyone thinks about between Hindu and Muslim at that period. But anyway, we won't get onto that for the moment, because we've got to talk about your period. Just finish us off. Eventually, what happened to this empire, which is one of the largest and most important sort of political units on Earth, really, in the early 19th century, was conflict with the British inevitable eventually? Well, it's a really good question. I mean, it grows to be massive. It grows to take over the vast majority of the Punjab, not all of the Punjab.

There's some Sikh, Prinsley states, Bajjala and Abadjan that manage to keep separate, but they kind of go under the umbrella shade of the company. And Ranjit Singh then expands it throughout the north of Punjab into nibbling away at bits of Afghanistan nibbling away at bits of Tibet you know around Ladakh and it takes over Jammu and Kashmir all of this kind of thing it becomes an incredibly wealthy incredibly powerful kingdom and as you said you know really crucial kind of linchpin for the politics of South and Central Asia it's the ultimate buffer zone in the Cold War between British India and all the main powers

in Central Asia and Russia. So it's at the epicentre of this new emerging global politics around South Asia. And I mean, I think Ranjit Singh really, he actually leverages his friendship with the East India Company from 1809 onwards to, it's like this ultimate competitive friendship right that they're they are they are the two powers you know at the olympics when there's two runners that are

you know equally amazing and you don't know which one's going to come out on top it's that sort of tension throughout the whole of his reign um but i i didn't think it was necessarily inevitable that the two would come to clash um but I think what happens is is that it's I think the mistake that Ranjit Singh makes or perhaps maybe it wasn't a mistake it was just you know a hope that it wouldn't it wouldn't go wrong is that he puts a lot of faith in the fact that he builds a strong relationship between the company and his successors and in that case the company really aren't as invested in his successors as they were in him they see they actually see him as this kind of fairly useful oriental despot type figure but they really don't

value his heirs and successors in the same way. And that's where you see the tension involved very quickly within 10 years of his death. All sorts of kind of fighting and politics start to come to the fore and you end up with an Anglo-Sikh war in 1845. And then again in 1849, and the kingdom being taken over. And I think it's only when, particularly when the East India Company's resident, Henry Lawrence, gets involved directly in the affairs of Lahore as a resident, that you really see a problem. Because he doesn't understand the political culture of the Punjab as much as he claims to. He's written books and articles galore and claims to be the expert. But he imposes this very idealized vision of royal culture on the Punjab that doesn't fit with with any of the dynamics that actually exist and that's where I think it becomes a bit more inevitable that this kingdom

would have fallen because its own natural organic way of doing things is all messed up. Priya this is that is so fascinating stuff what is your wonderful new book called? Royals and Rebels the Rise and Fall of the Sikh Empire. Is it hard writing Sikh history? I think it's hard as a Sikh. Are you a Sikh? I am a Sikh, yeah. I mean, it's hard because, I don't know, for a number of reasons, really. I mean, I've grown up with so many of these legends and so many of these stories. And it's interesting because often

it's a Sikh versus British or you know that kind of thing and when you get into your own history um you know and I guess it's the same for anybody really but when you're those mythologies get busted and you start looking at the at the more gritty aspects of things I think it's it can be difficult but also I think because Sikhs are a minority, and they're not only a minority in India, but also around the world, we cling on to those mythologies more strongly than a lot of others, perhaps. And that can also mean that writing your history can be quite emotionally and politically fraught.

So that's something that i've always struggled with but i've also once realized that you know it's a good struggle it's a healthy struggle because you'll get so much out of it and it's good to share that with people and and actually a more holistic richer deeper understanding will be more empowering in the long run than a romanticized half-baked one definitely but i have had a lot of interactions with Sikhs both in India but also like friends dads growing up and they would they as you well know when they shake you by the hand they look into your soul and they tell you that Sikhs are the greatest martial race on planet earth who have never lost a battle and you just stand there and go

tote yes got it sir absolutely got it i mean you don't want to mess with it you don't want to mess with a Sikh military history fan. No, no. No, I wouldn't either, to be honest with you. I'm not a Sikh military historian myself. I'm a gender historian and a culture historian. But yeah, no, it's always an interesting conversation. Yeah, it's an amazing, amazing, amazing tradition. Okay, so, well, thank you very much.

And thank you for coming back on the podcast and very good luck with this book. Thank you so much, and thank you for coming back on the podcast, and very good luck with this book. Thank you very much, Dan. Take care. Hi, everyone. It's me, Dan Snow. Just a quick request. It's so annoying, and I hate it when other podcasts do this,

but now I'm doing it, and I hate myself. Please, please go onto iTunes, wherever you get your podcasts, and give us a five-star rating and a review it really helps basically boosts up the chart which is good and then more people listen which is nice so if you could do that I'd be very grateful I understand if you want to subscribe to my tv channel I understand if you're not by my calendar but this is free come on do me a favor thanks you