Why Are Punjabis Divided Over the Man Who United Them?
Where is the Lahore Fort’s statue of #MaharajaRanjit Singh now?
Gurmeet Kaur
June 27th, 2022 on the death anniversary of Sher-e-Punjab Maharaja Ranjit Singh
During his forty-year reign that ended in 1839, Maharaja Ranjit Singh ushered in a golden era of peace, inter-religious harmony, and security in the Greater Undivided Punjab that was unmatched in history. Despite his achievements, the Maharaja is misunderstood, and even a hated figure in Lahore (West Punjab, now in Pakistan), the city he made his capital, because of a false colonial narrative imposed by the British that was never corrected.
To mark the 180th death anniversary of the Maharaja, on June 27th 2019, Pakistan installed a majestic life-size, fiberglass replica that depicts the Sikh king on one of his favorite horses, at the historic Lahore Fort, where he ruled from. This was the first time Pakistan acknowledged and honored the Maharaja in a public space, a significant step towards moving beyond the colonial narrative of Sikh-Muslim strife.
The installation of the sculpture was a welcome gesture by all of the Maharaja’s admirers, especially the Sikhs all over the world. It felt as if finally, West Punjab had decided to recognize the era in which it snuggled in safety and prosperity brought about by a ruler who loved it dearly and governed it with utmost fairness, wisdom, and humility.
But soon after the statue was installed it was targeted by vandals who violently attacked the sculpture, chanting slogans, breaking body parts, ultimately dismantling the bust from the horse, and throwing it on the ground — they vandalized the statue not once, or twice, but three times in two years. Watching a video of the last attack, what broke my heart was how little authorities seemed to care; how could it be that the culprits could target and destroy the same statue with hardly any action against them — so many times?
Since the third attack in 2021, the statue has been moved back to the Faqir Khana museum in Androon, the historic walled district of the Maharaja’s ancient capital, where it was conceived. Instead of remaining installed and displayed proudly at the Lahore fort, it stands hidden behind the locked gates.
On my April trip to the city, I had the fortune of seeing the statue — and meeting with the man who designed, sculpted, and lobbied the government to install it at the Lahore fort. Faqir Saifuddin, is a sixth generation descendant of one of the most trusted ministers of the Maharaja, Faqir Nooruddin, and runs the Faqir Khana museum which houses many precious artifacts and important documents from the Lahore Durbar. One can describe Faqir Saifuddin after having met him and spending several hours with him with just one word — Ishq (deepest form of love) — for the Maharaja.
In a conversation; he explained to me the historical lies that are still propagated to make west Punjabis believe that the Sikh Maharaja repressed his Muslim subjects, and to keep Punjabis divided.
GK: The statue of the Maharaja downstairs, is it another one or the same statue that was installed at the Lahore Fort? Is it here for repairs?
FS: It is the same statue. It has come back. The fort authorities couldn’t handle it anymore after many vandalism attempts and they returned it to us. The filthy haters, they would not stop. This is the travesty of our Qom (nation). We are a bunch of misled and brainwashed people who fail to recognize friends from foes. The statue has now been repaired and we hope to find a safer home for it.
GK: I’m so sorry to hear that. It must have been heartbreaking to see the labor of your love being disrespected so brutally. A lot of effort and resources must have gone into this project. Tell us how you felt about the statue when you first saw it completed. Tell us the most interesting facts about it that people may not know.
FS: In my eyes, it is the most beautiful sculpture of the Maharaja made thus far. It has come out exactly as I envisioned. It did go through a few iterations before I approved.
At first we chose Asp-i-Laili, his favorite horse who was also the last one he rode on, even in his sickness. But Laili was of a pure Persian breed, a very big horse, and our Maharaja of small stature in comparison (as you know he was short and of a lean build). That made the sculpture look a bit imbalanced — especially for someone looking up from the ground up. So we decided to change the horse. We rebuild the horse to the actual measurements of Kahar Bahaar — another one of his favorites, a smaller-sized horse, very intelligent and fast, only next to Asp-i-Laili.
The sculpture took eight months to finish.
GK: Many people have wondered about your choice of the Maharaja holding a bow and an arrow instead of a sword.
FS: People should know that it was the first time in a millennia that Punjab enjoyed art, education, health and leisure. While the Maharaja protected and secured his boundaries and fought wars to extend the security zones, he also took time to rebuild the damaged Punjab and uplift its spirit. He loved horse-back riding and was an archer of the finest kind. I wanted to show these two passions of the Maharaja that are also representative of the times he brought about for his Punjab, in this sculpture.
GK: History tells us that Lahorians actually invited Ranjit Singh to come rule Lahore and he obliged. There was a symbiotic relationship between him and the city. Tell us what you know from your ancestors to be true.
FS: Yes, He was invited to rule, indeed. Tired of the wars and invasions and caught in the period of double looting going back and forth between Afghans and the Bhangi Misl (one arm of the twelve that were part of the Sikh confederacy), with no actual governance, Lahorians left the city and the population diminished to about 35%. The depressed residents deliberated that they needed a ruler that can stand against the invaders and truly own Lahore. Many brave Sikh Misl chiefs came to their mind but their hunt stopped at the eighteen year old Ranjit. His Neknami (reputation) was that he was a warrior with a head on his shoulder, a man of his words who stood up for justice against anyone who challenged it.
Thirteen eminent personalities of Lahore got together (11 Muslims, 1 Hindu and 1 Sikh) and wrote a letter to him inviting him to be the King of Lahore. They had laid four conditions in that letter — 1. You shall govern, not loot us 2. You shall protect us from the Afghan and the Bhangi chiefs 3. You will open our places of worship for us 4. Your court will mete justice to all its citizens fairly.
Rest is history. Ranjit Singh kept his word till his last breath.
GK: Why has West Punjab of today then written him out of history? What do you think is the real cause of this hatred?
FS: The colonial narrative has everything to do with this hatred. The propaganda of the British started as soon as they started to plan to bring under their control the last independent nation of South Asia — the Punjab. They began to turn the Muslims against the Maharaja, since he was the biggest obstruction in their ambitions, and the Sikhs and Hindus against the Muslims — by twisting the facts.
When the East India Company took over Punjab in 1849, ten years after the death of the Maharaja, they circulated pictures of neglect of the Badshahi Mosque during the Sikh rule. Eager to define themselves in opposition to their predecessors as more civilized, tolerant, and progressive they spun tales of desecration.
Along with destroying the education system that the Maharaja built in Punjab, that was far superior to their own, they also spent a lot of resources in destroying his reputation.
Doing so worked in their favor of justifying their colonialism.
Today, the Pakistani narrative of Ranjit Singh is that of a Sikh ruler who oppressed the Muslims and desecrated our mosques because of the British.
In seventy-five years of post-colonist rule we have done nothing to reverse this hatred, in-fact we have taken the colonial narrative and spread it around via books in schools, madrassas, media and museums because the narrative of hate works in our favor. It is not very different from what India does against Muslims.
GK: When I talk to people in West Punjab about their grudge against the Maharaja, even the so-called educated ones mention him using the Badshahi mosque for his stable, an ammunition depot, and quarters for his soldiers preventing the people from praying there. Is there any truth to it?
FS: This is a bunch of lies that couldn’t be farther from the truth. If this was true my ancestors and many Muslim associates of the Maharaja would have been the most undignified folks of their times. The narrative that he suppressed Muslims is an obvious lie. He couldn’t have ruled 75% of his population that was Muslim — through cruelty or suppression for that long.
He had ruled by winning hearts. There is not one case of Muslim oppression that can be proven against him. He respected people of all faiths and gave them all a space to thrive for who they were. There was no second class citizenship in his rule, there were no communal tensions or riots, no capital punishment — ever. I have records of grants he gave to all mosques in this land. There was not one mosque (or temple or gurdwara) without a school attached to it because of generous grants given by him. Not only did he maintain the existing mosques, he constructed new ones.
Badshahi masjid was not meant for the commoners being in the vicinity of the royal fort and mansions. Only the nobility was allowed to pray there. In fact, it was opened for the commoners for the first time by Maharaja Ranjit Singh himself in 1811 by nudging the hesitant citizens to come and pray there. This is a recorded fact by my ancestors and Qazi Faizulla who was appointed the Mufti at the time.
Show me the records that he used the Badshahi mosque as his stable. I do not consider the propaganda of the British to be a fact.
GK: Last question: Shouldn’t the statue have been constructed using solid bronze rather than with fiberglass so it couldn’t break so easily?
FS: These haters would have found a way to destroy even the most solid material. Sadly the statue of a British, that divided and looted us, still stands here whereas the statue of the Maharaja who brought peace, prosperity and unity is not tolerated. This is our bankruptcy and misfortune.
Faqir Syed Saifuddin is a sixth generation of the Faqir family and the director of the Faqir Khana museum in Lahore. Three ancestors of his family, Fakir Nooruddin, Fakir Azizuddin, and Fakir Imamuddin were ministers and close advisors of Maharaja Ranjit Singh. He can be reached at faqirsaifuddin@gmail.com
Gurmeet Kaur is the author of children’s book series Fascinating Folktales of Punjab and The Valiant — Jaswant Singh Khalra, who lives in Oakville, Canada. She can be reached at info@folktalesofpunjab.com
