The Khalsa Misls From Kazan Singh.

[13Mirch]

I will like to profusely apologise to the mods for abusing their familial lineage during my last tenure on this forum. I will also like to apologise to anyone else who I abused, threatened or intimidated. I assure you I will now stick to the rules of this forum and not digress from anything at hand.

This is a recent article which I completed and posted upon my blog. I was highly frustrated by the lack of references or sources (written in the 21st century) detailing the activities of the Khalsa misls. One day I stumbled upon the memoirs of Major Henry Cour, an officer based in India during the early colonial days, and the works of Bhai Kazan Singh. They finally answered all my queries and here I provide a short sketch of the misls.

'Arising from the Tarna Dal, in the eighteenth century (1) the Khalsa Misls or confederacies succeeded in emphasizing upon, and establishing an autonomous reign for their wards in an undivided Punjab. Warring with the remnants of the Mughal empire, Nadir Shah's expansionist whims, Ahmad Shah Abdali (named the 'cur of Kabul') and the sub-continental Marathas, these confederacies often displayed a dual front to their foes at large. Periodically battling each other for loot and territorial extrapolation, they more often than not marginalized their differences for defensive purposes and expelling foreigners. Despite their instrumental role in establishing and preserving Khalsa-suzerainty in a post-Banda Singh period, most of these confederacies and their respective histories reside in ignorance. The Herculean names of the Ramgarhia, Sukarchakia, Singhpuria, Alhuwalia and KaroraSinghia confederacies have gained extensive credence in present-day Sikh thought, but their subtle yet decisive partners such as the Bhangis, the Nishanvalais or even Shahida are not paid much tribute or respect for their instrumentality in the said period. In an era where Khalsa politics has reached it's penultimate nadir, it is important to reminisce about the historicities orbiting these military/political bodies and deriving impertinent wisdom from the latter.'

http://tisarpanth.blogspot.co.nz/2014/04/a-short-sketch-of-khalsa-confederacies.html?view=timeslide