Editing Ranjit Singh (section)

===Khalsa Army===
{{For|the army commanders|List of generals of Ranjit Singh}} 
{{Main|Sikh Khalsa Army|Fauj-i-Ain|Fauj-i-Khas}}
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| footer = Ranjit Singh's army included Europeans. Left: [[Jean-François Allard]], Right: [[Alexander Gardner (soldier)|Alexander Gardner]]
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The army under Ranjit Singh was not limited to the Sikh community. The soldiers and troop officers included Sikhs, but also included Hindus, Muslims and Europeans.<ref name=tejasingh56>{{cite book|author1=Teja Singh|author2=Sita Ram Kohli|title=Maharaja Ranjit Singh|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YrG_aJTgnw0C |year=1986|publisher=Atlantic Publishers|pages=56, 67}}</ref> Hindu [[Brahmin]]s and people of all creeds and castes served his army,<ref>{{cite book|author=Khushwant Singh|title=Ranjit Singh|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D068dKeyGW4C  |year=2008|publisher=Penguin Books |isbn=978-0-14-306543-2 |page= 128 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Kaushik Roy|title=War, Culture and Society in Early Modern South Asia, 1740–1849|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zp0FbTniNaYC&pg=PA147 |year=2011|publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-136-79087-4 |pages=147 }}</ref> while the composition in his government also reflected a religious diversity.<ref name=tejasingh56/><ref name="Singh">{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D068dKeyGW4C | title=Ranjit Singh: Maharaja of the Punjab | publisher=Penguin Books | author=Singh, Khushwant | year=2008 | location=New Delhi | isbn=978-0-143-06543-2}}</ref> His army included Polish, Russian, Spanish, Prussian and French officers.<ref name=kaushikroyp143/> In 1835, as his relationship with the British warmed up, he hired a British officer named Foulkes.<ref name=kaushikroyp143>{{cite book|author=Kaushik Roy|title=War, Culture and Society in Early Modern South Asia, 1740–1849|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zp0FbTniNaYC&pg=PA147 |year=2011|publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-136-79087-4 |pages=143–144 }}</ref>

However, the Khalsa army of Ranjit Singh reflected the regional population, and as he grew his army, he dramatically increased the Rajputs and the Sikhs who became the predominant members of his army.<ref name=tejasingh65/> In the Doaba region his army was composed of the Jat Sikhs, in Jammu and northern Indian hills it was Hindu Rajputs, while relatively more Muslims served his army in the Jhelum river area closer to Afghanistan than other major Panjab rivers.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Teja Singh|author2=Sita Ram Kohli|title=Maharaja Ranjit Singh|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YrG_aJTgnw0C |year=1986|publisher=Atlantic Publishers|pages=83–85}}</ref>

====Reforms====
[[File:RanjitSingh by ManuSaluja.jpg|thumb|2009 portrait of Ranjit Singh wearing the [[Koh-i-Noor|Koh-i-noor]] diamond as an armlet.]]
Ranjit Singh changed and improved the training and organisation of his army. He reorganised responsibility and set performance standards in logistical efficiency in troop deployment, [[Maneuver warfare|manoeuvre]], and [[marksmanship]].<ref name=Singh /> He reformed the staffing to emphasise steady fire over cavalry and guerrilla warfare, and improved the equipment and methods of war. The military system of Ranjit Singh combined the best of both old and new ideas. He strengthened the infantry and the artillery.<ref name=tejasingh65>{{cite book|author1=Teja Singh|author2=Sita Ram Kohli|title=Maharaja Ranjit Singh|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YrG_aJTgnw0C |year=1986|publisher=Atlantic Publishers|pages=65–68}}</ref> He paid the members of the standing army from treasury, instead of the Mughal method of paying an army with local feudal levies.<ref name=tejasingh65/>

While Ranjit Singh introduced reforms in terms of training and equipment of his military, he failed to reform the old ''Jagirs'' (''Ijra'') system of Mughal middlemen.<ref name=sunitsingh64/><ref name="Brittlebank2008p65"/> The ''Jagirs'' system of state revenue collection involved certain individuals with political connections or inheritance promising a tribute (''nazarana'') to the ruler and thereby gaining administrative control over certain villages, with the right to force collect customs, excise and land tax at inconsistent and subjective rates from the peasants and merchants; they would keep a part of collected revenue and deliver the promised tribute value to the state.<ref name=sunitsingh64/><ref name="Grewal1998p115">{{cite book|author=J. S. Grewal|title=The Sikhs of the Punjab|url=https://archive.org/details/sikhsofpunjab0000grew |url-access=registration|year=1998|publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-63764-0 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/sikhsofpunjab0000grew/page/114 114]–119 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Harjot Oberoi|title=The Construction of Religious Boundaries: Culture, Identity, and Diversity in the Sikh Tradition|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dKl84EYFkTsC |year=1994|publisher=University of Chicago Press|isbn=978-0-226-61593-6 |pages=85–87 }}</ref> These ''Jagirs'' maintained independent armed militia to extort taxes from the peasants and merchants, and the militia was prone to violence.<ref name=sunitsingh64/> This system of inconsistent taxation with arbitrary extortion by militia, continued the Mughal tradition of ill treatment of peasants and merchants throughout the Sikh Empire, and is evidenced by the complaints filed to Ranjit Singh by East India Company officials attempting to trade within different parts of the Sikh Empire.<ref name=sunitsingh64/><ref name="Brittlebank2008p65"/>

According to historical records, Sunit Singh, Ranjit Singh's reforms focused on the military that would allow new conquests, but not towards the taxation system to end abuse, nor on introducing uniform laws in his state or improving internal trade and empowering the peasants and merchants.<ref name=sunitsingh64>{{cite book|author=Sunit Singh|editor=Pashaura Singh and Louis E. Fenech|title=The Oxford Handbook of Sikh Studies|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=7YwNAwAAQBAJ |year=2014|publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-100411-7 |pages=62–65 }}</ref><ref name="Brittlebank2008p65">{{cite book|author=Kate Brittlebank|title=Tall Tales and True: India, Historiography and British Imperial Imaginings|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bnwMAQAAMAAJ |year=2008|publisher=Monash University Press|isbn=978-1-876924-61-4 |pages=65 }}</ref><ref name="Grewal1998p115"/> This failure to reform the ''Jagirs''-based taxation system and economy, in part led to a succession power struggle and a series of threats, internal divisions among Sikhs, major assassinations and coups in the Sikh Empire in the years immediately after the death of Ranjit Singh;<ref name="Low1991p263"/> an easy annexation of the remains of the Sikh Empire into British India followed, with the colonial officials offering the ''Jagirs'' better terms and the right to keep the system intact.<ref>{{cite book|author=Sunit Singh|editor=Pashaura Singh and Louis E. Fenech|title=The Oxford Handbook of Sikh Studies|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=7YwNAwAAQBAJ |year=2014|publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-100411-7 |pages=65–68 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Nicola Mooney|title=Rural Nostalgias and Transnational Dreams: Identity and Modernity Among Jat Sikhs|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=k1B2vdLBizIC |year=2011|publisher=University of Toronto Press|isbn=978-0-8020-9257-1 |pages=68–69 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Major|first1=Andrew J.|title=The Political Inheritance of Pakistan|editor=DA Low|publisher= Springer, Cambridge University Commonwealth Series| chapter=The Punjabi Chieftains and the Transition from Sikh to British Rule|year=1991| pages=53–85|doi=10.1007/978-1-349-11556-3_3|isbn= 978-1-349-11558-7}}</ref>

====Infrastructure investments====
[[File:Maharaja Ranjit singh's treasure.jpg|thumb|A [[lithography|lithograph]] by [[Emily Eden]] showing one of the favourite horses of Maharaja Ranjit Singh and his collection of jewels, including the [[Koh-i-Noor]]]]Ranjit Singh ensured that Panjab manufactured and was self-sufficient in all weapons, equipment and munitions his army needed.<ref name="kaushikroyp143" /> His government invested in infrastructure in the 1800s and thereafter, established raw materials mines, cannon foundries, gunpowder and arms factories.<ref name="kaushikroyp143" /> Some of these operations were owned by the state, and others were operated by private Sikh operatives.<ref name="kaushikroyp143" />

However, Ranjit Singh did not make major investments in other infrastructure such as irrigation canals to improve the productivity of land and roads. The prosperity in his Empire, in contrast to the Mughal-Sikh wars era, largely came from the improvement in the security situation, reduction in violence, reopened trade routes and greater freedom to conduct commerce.<ref>{{cite book|author=Sunit Singh|editor=Pashaura Singh and Louis E. Fenech|title=The Oxford Handbook of Sikh Studies|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=7YwNAwAAQBAJ |year=2014|publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-100411-7 |pages=62–63 }}</ref>