Pretty much. Though in this scenario, Bahawalpur would almost certainly be butterflied away from becoming a British princely state in this scenario, and remain a vassal state of the Sikh Empire instead, unless the British were willing to fight an early Anglo-Sikh War to 'liberate it', along with the portion of Sindh east of Indus; all of which, south of Khairpur, was ruled over by the Mankani branch of the Talpur dynasty, whose ruler was a vocal ally of Maharajah Ranjit Singh and the Sukerchakia dynasty.
In this sort of scenario though, you wouldn't expect the British to be happy about Qajar Persia, especially one that's more closely aligned with the Russians than IOTL, controlling as much of Balochistan as it does on that map; no way they'd be content settling for just the port city of Gwadar, as an isolated enclave on its own, when they have clear naval superiority, when Oman's been its de-facto vassal state since 1800, and when the map of the Sultanate of Oman's control at the time looked like this, thanks to a lease agreement with Persia whereby they controlled the coastal stretch of some 100 miles from Sadij to Khamir, and inland about 30 miles, as far as Shamil, as well as controlling the islands of Hormuz and Qeshm.Does Herat falling necessarily mean that Kabul falls as well?
A map like this seems plenty possible. Qajar Persia controls most of Balochistan and Herat, but the Emirate of Afghanistan would still stand.
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Looking at a topographical map - it seems plenty possible that Herat and Afghan Balochistan would be the extent of Qajar Persia's advance. I suppose Kandahar and Quetta would be areas the Qajar dynasty could try for though.
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Certainly one of the more plausible outcomes; especially if Maharajah Ranjit Singh's successors decide to maintain amiable relations with the British, favoring consolidation over conducting any further wars with its neighbors. Maharajah Kharak Singh, in particular, was purportedly thus inclined (being a supporter and follower of the most pacifistic sect of Sikhism), and sought to maintain good relations with the British. Nau Nihal Singh, though, was markedly more jingoistic, as were the majority of the senior generals in the Sikh Army. And the Commander-in-chief of the Sikh Army especially, Hari Singh Nalwa, certainly wouldn't be content with those north-western borders- they'd mean that his own efforts to conquer Hazara had all been in vain, and that Afghanistan had been freely allowed to reunify, in spite of the weakening of Afghan rule in Kabul having already seen the majority of its governors declare their own independence, and the Afghan state having already effectively been balkanized before reunification and consolidation under Dost Mohammad Khan's rule IOTL.Perhaps this map?
The Qajars conquer Herat, but the British refuse to leave Bandar Abbas, Kharga, or Gwadar. The Balochi Khanates seek British protection, and Britain later takes the bulk of Qajar Balochistan.
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Great post.Certainly one of the more plausible outcomes; especially if Maharajah Ranjit Singh's successors decide to maintain amiable relations with the British, favoring consolidation over conducting any further wars with its neighbors. Maharajah Kharak Singh, in particular, was purportedly thus inclined (being a supporter and follower of the most pacifistic sect of Sikhism), and sought to maintain good relations with the British. Nau Nihal Singh, though, was markedly more jingoistic, as were the majority of the senior generals in the Sikh Army. And the Commander-in-chief of the Sikh Army especially, Hari Singh Nalwa, certainly wouldn't be content with those north-western borders- they'd mean that his own efforts to conquer Hazara had all been in vain, and that Afghanistan had been freely allowed to reunify, in spite of the weakening of Afghan rule in Kabul having already seen the majority of its governors declare their own independence, and the Afghan state having already effectively been balkanized before reunification and consolidation under Dost Mohammad Khan's rule IOTL.
During the early years of his first reign though, Dost Mohammad Khan's influence was generally confined to Kabul and Ghazni. In the 1820s, the Kabul realm under the Barakzais' authority ended just twenty miles south of Kabul, whilst the base of the Hindu Kush formed the northern boundary of his realm until 1826, when a rebellious brother of his, named Habibullah, controlled Parwan with a force of Uzbeks and Hazaras. Although Dost Mohammad controlled Bamyan, the routes leading there were controlled by independent Hazara chiefdoms. In the east of his realm, the extent of his rule ended at Jagdalak pass, while Jalalabad and Laghman remained under the control of Muhammad Zaman Khan and Abd-Al-Jabbar Khan respectively. And despite Ghazni being a part of Dost Mohammad's sphere of influence, Amir Muhammad exercised direct control over the city, with it being unknown if he ever submitted revenue payments to Dost Mohammad. All these combined made the early Muhammadzai Kingdom surely possibly doomed to fail, having been isolated directly by most of the other powers of Afghanistan, and drawn into conflict with others occasionally, alongside nominal discontent- including amongst his brothers, who were seeking to fight for rule over Kabul- the early Muhammadzai Kingdom appeared as if it would not fare well.
But that all began to change in early 1834, when Shah Shuja, the former Durrani ruler of Afghanistan, began approaching Kandahar, as the Dil brothers appeased to Dost Mohammad for assistance against Shah Shuja. Rather than mobilizing his forces toward Kandahar as promised though, Dost Mohammad led his forces eastwards to Siyahsang instead, with his sons Mohammad Akram Khan and Muhammad Akbar Khan sent to Jalalabad, where they "scattered" the army of Muhammad Zaman Khan, on an attack which was justified under the claimed pretext of raising an army to combat Shah Shuja. Following this, Dost lead his forces to Jagdalak (controlling the Lataband Pass), which was ruled by Muhammad Usman Khan under Zaman Khan. Immediately as Dost Mohammad fielded his armies outside the city, Usman Khan surrendered the city to Dost, under the condition that the city would be spared from a military attack. With Dost Mohammad having now attempted to seize Jalalabad, Zaman Khan entered negotiations with Sultan Mohammad Khan to support him in case of another attack from Dost in Kabul. However, Sultan Mohammad Khan was unable to provide any aid to Zaman, since Peshawar had been weakened far too much in the past few years (both under the rule of Barelvi's 'Islamic State', and in its subsequent re-pacification by the Sikhs).
Only supported by local chiefs, Zaman Khan found himself unable to field a proper army to contest Dost Mohammad as he marched on Jalalabad. Dost Mohammad seized the city, but offered generous and honorable peace terms, one of which was that he'd compensate Zaman Khan with over 150,000 rupees per year for his annexed territories. Having now secured Jalalabad, Dost Mohammad appointed Muhammad Akram Khan and Amir Muhammad Khan as governors of the city. The Province of Jalalabad under Dost's rule extended as far as Dakka in Mohmand territory from the Jagdalak pass. The province of Jalalabad alone and the villages of Lagman fielded over 400,000 rupees of revenue, and following Dost Mohammad's conquest, it raised to around 465,000 rupees. Followed by this conquest, many new regions became subject to Dost Mohammad, including the valley of Kunar, where the governor was appointed by Dost Mohammad Khan in exchange for tribute. Dost Mohammad then marched on Kandahar in 1834, having exploited the situation at hand to gain more influence over Kandahar. Shah Shuja set out in the summer of 1834 to Kandahar, having already routed the armies of the Talpurs of Sindh and reclaimed Shikarpur for himself; but this expedition was a failure, as Shah Shuja's siege ended in only 54 days, with Shah Shuja's army being defeated in early July by the joint coalition between Dost Mohammad Khan and the rulers of Kandahar.
In this scenario though, how much would all of that change? Haven't quite got round to posting the pertinent part of the TL I started working on (which would be Chapter 6, with at least one or two interludes to go between the point I've gotten to and that point), but gave up on posting due to lack of interest. But in my take on it, the repercussions of Barelvi's earlier death, and the completed conquest of Shikarpur by the Sikhs already by 1831, were also set to have pretty significant cascade effects on Shah Shuja's pending expedition, which would in turn also greatly alter how things pan out in the ongoing 'Barakzai Civil War'.
After all, ITTL, the army of Peshawar, under the command of ʿAbd al-Rasul Khan (son of Sardar Rahimdad Khan, and husband to Sardar Dost Muhammad Khan’s sister) and trained by the Russian adventurer Vieskenawitch (who'd previously been employed by Shah Abbas Mirza)- which Sultan Muhammad Khan had sent out to do battle with Barelvi's Muhammadiyan Order IOTL, only for them to be routed after ʿAbd al-Rasul was killed in the resulting battle, with Sultan Muhammad Khan subsequently fleeing the city with his retinue, being granted sanctuary by the Sikhs (though he continued to govern the southern portion of the province of Peshawar, from the city of Kohat instead), whilst Barelvi and the Muhammadiyans' forces subsequently marched into and conquered the city of Peshawar largely unopposed in early 1830, filling the power vacuum left behind after Sultan Muhammad Khan's flight to establish their short-lived 'Islamic Caliphate of the Peshawar'- is still very much intact, leaving Sultan Muhammad Khan's grasp on power as the ruler of Peshawar no less tenuous than those of the Nawab of Bahawalpur, or the fellow Barakzai rulers of Jalalabad and Kandahar.
Shah Shuja has no choice but to go through the passages now controlled by the Sikhs, unless he's willing to wait until the British consolidate their own control further long enough to think about going in to seize Kandahar for himself via the Balochi Khanates. If Dost Mohammad Khan still follows the course of action he did IOTL, leading his forces eastwards to Jalalabad to conquer Muhammad Zaman Khan's territories first,with Zaman Khan even likelier to enter negotiations with Sultan Mohammad Khan to support him against Dost Mohammad Khan's forces, Sultan Mohammad Khan WOULD be able to provide that support, and dispatch a proper army against Dost Mohammad's march on Jalalabad. And if said coalition's army met the same fate it did against Barelvi's forces regardless, then the Sikhs'd likely obtain Muhammad Zaman Khan's vassalage as well, with the Province of Jalalabad a lot more likely to then also fall under the Sikhs' sphere of influence in the same manner.
Especially if Shah Shuja and his mercenary force is still allowed free passage via the Bolan Pass to march against Kandahar, with none of its own manpower, supplies or funds expended on their efforts to conquer and impose his dominion over the Talpurs or the territory of Shikarpur along the way. TBH, having only gotten about 5yrs or so into this TL from the original POD, I'm still not even sure if the Kingdom of Afghanistan's ultimately still going to exist 10yrs later ITTL. An awful lot of things just so happened to fall perfectly into place for Dost Mohammad Khan's kingdom to ultimately succeed in its reunification and consolidation IOTL. But since a bunch of those things have already unavoidably fallen out of place due to the POD in the adjacent territories, I don't know if it'd still be plausible for him to pull it off any more...
Great post.
Without British colonialism, how far do you think the Sikhs would be able to advance into Afghan territory? Most of what became the North-West Frontier Province was already under Sikh control when the British arrived. On the other hand, the British were never able to pacify the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and even Pakistan had minimal control there until the Afghan-Soviet War.
Perhaps. Though I wasn't going to go for quite so much of a Sikh-wank (not for several decades after the POD, at any rate), on the grounds that attempting to consolidate and pacify all of that in one go would almost certainly leave the Sikh Empire over-extended, and make them far likelier to crumble if/when the British decide to try seizing their territories for their own. Afghanistan, in the 1820's to early '30s, was a patchwork quilt of petty chiefdoms and independent emirates, each governed by rulers who were constantly at war with one another. In this scenario, then Jalalabad becomes a lot more likely than not to fall into the Sikhs' possession too. After all, suzerainty over Jalalabad was the bare minimum which was demanded by Maharajah Ranjit Singh in exchange for granting Shah Shuja's passage to try and reclaim the throne of Afghanistan for his Durrani dynasty (having already ceded Peshawar in exchange for free passage for his previous attempt, which had already failed), and with Shikarpur and the access route via the Bolan Pass having already been seized for themselves by the Sikh Empire, Shah Shuja'd no longer have any choice but to accept those terms.So this? Assuming the Khan of Kalat becomes a vassal of the Sikhs and the Sikhs take Kandahar
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Like I cited earlier in this thread, plenty of others historically converted, or were already deemed 'close enough' to self-identify as Sikhs even if the mainstream Sikhs at Amritsar would later exclude them as 'Nanakpanthis, not real Sikhs'. And the method via which so many so readily and swiftly converted to Sikhism was practically identical to that via which so many had converted to Islam in the first place. One of the primary reasons why Islam became more favorable in India was due to the establishment of Khanqah- commonly defined as a hospice, lodge, community center, or dormitory ran by Sufis. Khanqahs were also known as Jama'at Khana, large gathering halls. Structurally, a khanqah could be one large room or have additional dwelling space. Although some khanqah establishments were independent of royal funding or patronage, many received fiscal grants (waqf) and donations from benefactors for continuing services. Over time, the function of traditional Sufi khanqahs evolved as Sufism solidified in India.Would there be much conversion to Sikhism? Sikhs were at most 12% of the Sikh Empire historically. Even if the Balochis of Sindh convert, or perhaps the people of Nuristan as well, the Sikhs are still a significant minority group ruling over a predominately Muslim population (some 65 to 70 percent of the Empire's population historically).
I'm not confident the Sikhs would engage in overseas colonialism. Colonialism is costly, and they'd need to be ever-present of the threats to their north and west.
I doubt Britain moves the capital from Calcutta to New Delhi in a world where New Delhi is close to an international border.
I wonder how the prospect of at least two successful non-white countries emerging in the nineteenth century (Sikh Empire and Japan) impacts European racist attitudes.
I think you’re right that there’d be conversion to Sikhism, and much of this would be driven by the langar system. But you’re wrong to assume the trend of conversion would last forever. For one a large portion of the elite and bureaucracy was Hindu and Muslim - they wouldn’t look positively upon religious conversion (reverence for the Gurus among Punjabi Hindus might make them more okay with it - but that’s different from conversion, and not all Hindus in the Sikh Empire were Punjabi). State-sponsored religious conversion would make them deeply suspicious of the state, and also it might result in escalation as Hindus and Muslims engage in combative “reconversion” - as indeed occurred in OTL Punjab in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Not a good climate for stability. Eventually, the Sikh Empire will have to cool it with the state-sponsored conversion, or risk alienating much of its population.Like I cited earlier in this thread, plenty of others historically converted, or were already deemed 'close enough' to self-identify as Sikhs even if the mainstream Sikhs at Amritsar would later exclude them as 'Nanakpanthis, not real Sikhs'. And the method via which so many so readily and swiftly converted to Sikhism was practically identical to that via which so many had converted to Islam in the first place. One of the primary reasons why Islam became more favorable in India was due to the establishment of Khanqah- commonly defined as a hospice, lodge, community center, or dormitory ran by Sufis. Khanqahs were also known as Jama'at Khana, large gathering halls. Structurally, a khanqah could be one large room or have additional dwelling space. Although some khanqah establishments were independent of royal funding or patronage, many received fiscal grants (waqf) and donations from benefactors for continuing services. Over time, the function of traditional Sufi khanqahs evolved as Sufism solidified in India.
Initially, the Sufi khanqah life emphasized a close and fruitful relationship between the master-teacher (sheikh) and their students. For example, students in khanqahs would pray, worship, study, and read works together. But the other major function of a khanqah was of a community shelter, with many of these facilities being built in low caste, rural, Hindu vicinities, and the Chishti Order Sufis especially establishing khanqahs with the highest form of modest hospitality and generosity. Keeping a "visitors welcome" policy, khanqahs in India offered spiritual guidance, psychological support, and counseling that was free and open to all people. The spiritually hungry and depressed caste members were both fed with a free kitchen service and provided basic education. By creating egalitarian communities within stratified caste systems, Sufis successfully spread their teachings, and it was this example of Sufi brotherhood and equity that drew people to the religion of Islam. Soon these khanqahs became social, cultural, and theological epicenters for people of all ethnic and religious backgrounds and genders. Through a khanqah's services, Sufis presented a form of Islam that forged a way for voluntary large scale conversions of lower class Hindus.
And perhaps the primary reason for Sikhism's rapid expansion in this period was that their Sikh Gurdwaras (and to a lesser extent, nominally 'Sikh' Mandirs and Havelis) took over from the Sufi Khanqahs, providing the same community shelter, free kitchen, basic education and counselling services that the Sufis had, to create egalitarian communities within the stratified caste systems. But to an even greater extent, and thus drawing people to Sikhism predominantly from the lower strata of the society as well, utilizing the same pre-established methodology which had converted them and their ancestors to Islam in the first place, aided greatly by the Sikh Empire allocating a markedly greater portion of its funds towards providing them with fiscal grants (which supported the continuation and expansion of these Gurdwaras' services) than those rulers who'd previously patronized the Sufi khanqahs had. Tthough Kharak Singh was noted for having personally provided equal patronage to the Sufi khanqahs and Bhakti mandirs as well, on the grounds of impartiality and true religious egalitarianism- mostly with disapproval, with this cited as one of the primary justifications for his contemporary characterization by the Sikh nobility in the Lahore Darbar as a 'naive, idealistic imbecile'.
With this trend having been exacerbated, and the pace of conversion from both Hinduism and Sufism to Sikhism increased, as mainstream Islam itself in the 19th century increasingly decried and persecuted Sufism as a heretical, with the rise of state-sponsored extremist Shi'ite clericalism having led to the widespread destruction of Sufi khanqahs and shrines on the part of hardline clerics across all the lands controlled by Shi'ite rulers (including the late Mughal, Durrani and Safavid Empires), leaving behind an increasing vacuum which was mostly filled by the establishment of Sikh Gurdwaras instead, across the lands controlled by the Sikhs. And examples of their efficacy in converting peoples to Sikhism can be seen by looking at the Bugtis of Dera Bugti (which may look relatively unimportant and barren at first glance, but which also happens to be where the overwhelming majority of natural gas reserves in the wider region are located, with its gas fields estimated to have larger reserves than the entirety of the UK and Mexico combined) and Khetrans of Barkhan as case studies.
Both were cited as being c.5-7% Sikh IOTL well into the 20th century; with this large Sikh minority almost exclusively attributable to the brief period in 1845-1847 when Sir Charles James Napier's force of over 7,000 men attacked the Bugtis, having declared the defiant Bugti tribe a 'criminal tribe' and placed a bounty of ten rupees on every man’s head, dead or alive. This was in spite of the British having had nothing but praise for their chivalry, asserting that they 'refused to surrender against heavy odds, preferred to fight hand to hand, never took advantage of the terrain, and never shot their enemies in the back', and their qualities as the 'most laborious and desirable peasantry among the turbulent and predatory Balouchs'. Instead, Napier's campaign was motivated seemingly almost entirely on the basis of spite and exasperation, having finally been forced to cede defeat in his efforts to attract them as recruits to the Company's armed forces on account of the Bugtis' point-blank refusal to give up their tribal attire (wearing traditionally all-white robes and turbans) or to contemplate cutting their hair or beards.
This forced thousands of Bugtis (along with hundreds of Khetrans, when the Marri then seized the opportunity to also attack both the greatly weakened Bugtis and the Khetrans, mounting heavy slaving raids against their settlements and seizing much of their lands for themselves), to flee across the border and take temporary refuge in the Derajat region of the Sikh Empire. And with these refugees having predominantly been granted refuge in the dormitories of Sikh Gurdwaras, almost the entirety of these refugees adopted Sikhism within that short 2-3 year period of time, with almost all of their descendants continuing to practice Sikhism from then onwards up until General Musharraf's progroms to islamicize Balochistan (in an attempt to stamp out support for the Baloch nationalist insurgency movement). Sikhism succeeded, and achieved its greatest period of growth during this period, primarily because it offered this social support network to its citizens, with the Sikh Empire implementing its basal version of the welfare state in this manner, and the Sikhs' Gurdwaras also serving the function of religiously institutionalized social welfare hubs (much like the Freedom Arches in Eric Flint's 1632 series, which can be summarized as 'Temples to spread the faith of American Exceptionalism across downtime Europe, just like Gurdwaras spread the faith of Sikhism, Bhakti Mandirs spread the faith of Bhakti Hinduism, and Khanqahs spread the faith of Sufism across India and Persia') to a markedly greater extent than they do today.
However, this trend was swiftly brought to a halt under British rule, as the British East India Company and its successor the British Raj effectively ended all state-sponsored revenue streams for these long-established traditional pre-existing theological welfare networks across British India, as well as enacting social engineering policies which saw the racial categorization of all groups and castes as "agricultural", "martial" (including the Sikhs), "criminal" and so on. The mid-19th century concept that behavior was hereditary rather than learned, which had been popularized by social reformers back in England such as Mary Carpenter (who'd coined the term "dangerous classes"), was applied across British India, thus racializing crime, with what was merely social determinism till then becoming entrenched as biological determinism, and with the Sikhs' new categorization as merely a "martial race of Hindus" thus all but ending any further conversions to Sikhism from other faiths. In an enduring Sikh Empire though, where these English philosophies of biological determinism would be extremely unlikely to be adopted, then this would've continued; and if people had continued to convert to Sikhism from other faiths at the same rate that they'd done on average over the course of Maharajah Ranjit Singh's rule, the percentage of its population who identified as Sikh would've been projected to surpass 25% by the 1870's, and become an absolute majority well before the outbreak of OTL's WW1.
Of course, that'd be with the assumption of continued, unchecked exponential growth, which doesn't often happen IRL, and isn't likely to in this instance. But IMHO, the incentives and motivations which drove these religious conversions would've only been increased further (counter-acting the inevitable increases in reactionary opposition to Sikhism which you'd get from other religious communities as it continues to grow) as the Sikh Empire enters the industrial era. Socialism emerged as a response to the expanding capitalist system, presenting an alternative aimed at improving the lot of the working class and creating a more egalitarian society; Sikhism also emerged as a response to the expanding capitalist system (particularly the Jizya taxes upon all non-Muslims, after its reimposition by Aurangzeb), presenting an alternative aimed at improving the lot of the working class and creating a more egalitarian society. As such, Sikhism can essentially be summarized as an overtly religious, Pandeist Dharmic socialist utopian movement. Though one could also imagine that this could well make the political landscape of a surviving Sikh Empire at this stage in its history extremely interesting, since the increased class/caste struggles engendered by industrialization could well see the rise of a Sikh religious equivalent to the Chartist movement at the very least, potentially escalating to an outright pseudo-Communist, Marxist or Bolshevist movement the longer that the reforms advocated by them go unimplemented...
Regarding colonialism; it may well be costly, and they'd need to be vigilant of the ever-present threats to their north and west, but the Omanis' slave trade in their own citizens also presents a distinct threat. Which had been purposefully engineered at this stage to be as insulting and disrespectful towards the Sikhs in particular as it possibly could be, with two out of every three slaves being shipped out across the Straits of Hormuz being women to boot, will certainly invoke a lot of jingoism and adventurism from the Sikhs, who'd want to snuff it out and punish the Sultanate of Oman for it ASAP. And rather than such efforts actually being conceived and setting sail as colonialist endeavors to establish settlements, I was thinking more along the lines of the Sikhs' fledgling naval presence being initially employed to assemble its own equivalent of the USA's African Slave Trade Patrol, and thus tolerated by the British insofar as it aligns with their own goals and lightens the load for its own Royal Navy operations as they begin interdicting slave trading in the Middle East and the Indian Ocean; with supply bases in the Middle East and Africa itself then established to better facilitate this themselves, before these bases then grow into trading posts, amass settler populations (incl. freed slaves) and form the cores of colonial territories of their own accord, in a manner vaguely resembling the inception of Freetown and the first iteration of British West Africa IOTL.
As for how the prospect of at least two successful non-white countries emerging in the nineteenth century (Sikh Empire and Japan) would impact European racist attitudes- the problem with that is that it'd be trivially easy for the Europeans to say that "oh, we already know that Alexander the Great expanded Europe all the way to the Indus river, these Kalash subjects of the Sikhs themselves claim that they're direct descendants of Alexander the Great's troops who settled in the area over 2 millennia ago (with more than enough of them having the pale skin, fair hair, and Aryan eye colors to back it up); clearly the Sikhs, being Indo-Aryans, are as successful as they are because they're actually White Europeans- albeit greatly diluted with non-Whites in a similar fashion to Mexicans (and/or our Gypsies, whose Romani language we know realize is a variant of their 'Saraiki/Multani' tongue, and who we know realize basically belong to the same Punjabi race as the Sikhs anyway), and similarly racially inferior to ourselves". As such, it's extremely likely that a successful Sikh Empire'd have no greater impact upon European racist attitudes than the existence of the successful Ottoman Empire did- with both falling to the circular logic that "they're successful, so they're Europeans/Aryans. Ish. Kind of. Enough for them not to debunk our European supremacism, anyway. But still nowhere near enough for us to accept them as racial equals, of course..."
I'm certainly not assuming that the trend of conversion would last forever, or maintain the same exponential growth rate; it'll definitely slow down over time, until it reaches a point where it plateaus out and the Sikh's share of the total population stabilizes. But it's a question of when, and where that increasing share of the total population would level out. And it wasn't just driven by the langar system- the langar system's merely the most enduring and universal of the services provided to the general population by the Gurdwaras, but during the Sikh Imperial period, they offered an awful lot more to the general populace as well. You wanted to learn how to read and write, and become literate? In a (short-lived, IOTL) state-subsidized initiative which was personally championed by Prince Kharak Singh's wife Chand Kaur (Nau Nihal Singh's mother), you could go to any gurdwara in the Sikh Empire and pick up a free alphabet book, regardless of whether you were a man or woman, with it being mandatory to provide these to the bride and groom whenever any weddings took place in them, as well as providing them to any mothers whenever a naming/christening ceremony for a newborn baby was conducted there. Want to put those literacy skills to good use? The majority of Gurdwaras also provided public libraries, not only consisting of Sikh literature, but of other religious texts, secular texts and even works of fiction as well; where people weren't permitted to check out books, but where anyone could come in and read freely, provided they respected Sikh customs (e.g, covered head, no substance abuse) within the temple grounds. And the same went for a bunch of other social services, including clerical work, homeless shelters, and sometimes even basic medical care. I wouldn't have bothered to bring it up if it were just the langar system that they provided; but it was so much more than that.I think you’re right that there’d be conversion to Sikhism, and much of this would be driven by the langar system. But you’re wrong to assume the trend of conversion would last forever. For one a large portion of the elite and bureaucracy was Hindu and Muslim - they wouldn’t look positively upon religious conversion (reverence for the Gurus among Punjabi Hindus might make them more okay with it - but that’s different from conversion, and not all Hindus in the Sikh Empire were Punjabi). State-sponsored religious conversion would make them deeply suspicious of the state, and also it might result in escalation as Hindus and Muslims engage in combative “reconversion” - as indeed occurred in OTL Punjab in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Not a good climate for stability. Eventually, the Sikh Empire will have to cool it with the state-sponsored conversion, or risk alienating much of its population.
On a related note, the religious demographic estimates I’ve seen for the Sikh Empire vary wildly. Sometimes they say it was 80% Muslim, other times it’s less than 50% Muslim - an error bar exceeding 30%! I’m guessing this might be because some estimates include the Himachali vassal states and others do not, but I’m not really sure. Do you have any idea why this is the case?
Thanks for the detailed reply. In your opinion, why was it that by the time of the Partition of India, Sikhs were not a majority in any district of British India? They were spread from Peshawar to Delhi with the highest population being in Amritsar, a religious center for them, but even Amritsar had a Muslim plurality.I'm certainly not assuming that the trend of conversion would last forever, or maintain the same exponential growth rate; it'll definitely slow down over time, until it reaches a point where it plateaus out and the Sikh's share of the total population stabilizes. But it's a question of when, and where that increasing share of the total population would level out. And it wasn't just driven by the langar system- the langar system's merely the most enduring and universal of the services provided to the general population by the Gurdwaras, but during the Sikh Imperial period, they offered an awful lot more to the general populace as well. You wanted to learn how to read and write, and become literate? In a state-subsidized initiative which was personally championed by Prince Kharak Singh's wife Chand Kaur (Nau Nihal Singh's mother), you could go to any gurdwara in the Sikh Empire and pick up a free alphabet book, regardless of whether you were a man or woman, with it being mandatory to provide these to the bride and groom whenever any weddings took place in them, as well as providing them to any mothers whenever a naming/christening ceremony for a newborn baby was conducted there. Want to put those literacy skills to good use? The majority of Gurdwaras also provided public libraries, not only consisting of Sikh literature, but of other religious texts, secular texts and even works of fiction as well; where people weren't permitted to check out books, but where anyone could come in and read freely, provided they respected Sikh customs (e.g, covered head, no substance abuse) within the temple grounds. And the same went for a bunch of other social services, including clerical work, homeless shelters, and sometimes even basic medical care. I wouldn't have bothered to bring it up if it were just the langar system that they provided; but it was so much more than that.
Was it state sponsored conversion? No more so than state-sponsored social welfare systems should be considered as 'state-sponsored conversion to socialism'. Which isn't to say that reactionaries wouldn't, and didn't, paint it that way- of course they did, and would do so. But those who benefit from such initiatives- who'll always be the 'silent majority' of people, due to inescapable inequalities in wealth distribution- won't ever see it that way. And when the alternatives are either 'we'll provide support, but only if you're from a sufficiently high caste, otherwise begone inferior filth'; 'we'll provide support, but only if you renounce all your heathen cultural and religious practices and convert to Islam first, otherwise we're religiously obligated to enslave you or kill you, seeing as how you're a kafir and all', or 'we'll offer our support to everyone irrespective of their culture, religion or gender, so long as you respect our faith and others' whilst you're under our roof, and you're definitely not obligated to convert to Sikhism if you partake of our aid, but it'd be polite to at least consider it, and we'd be really happy if you did convert', it's pretty obvious and self-explanatory why the latter held the most appeal.
On that related note though, those religious demographic estimates for the Sikh Empire do indeed vary wildly. And this can primarily be attributed to the fact that the different BEIC employees who conducted and/or compiled the scouting surveys which came up with these estimates- predominantly Charles Metcalfe, Alexander Burnes, William Moorcroft and Lt. Wade- all supported different interest groups, and thus submitted their own religious demographic estimates based upon differing definitions of what constituted 'Sikhs', 'Muslims' and 'Hindus'.
Those highest Muslim estimates, of 80%, which can be sourced back to the findings of William Moorcroft's expedition to Bukhara in 1821- with Moorcroft having had his own blatantly evident jingoist agenda, and submitted said estimates in an 'engagement' to the British Resident in Delhi, along with a letter to the Governor-General from the Raja of Ladakh offering formal allegiance to the Company (on the grounds that "it used to pay tribute to Delhi under Mughal rule, BRITAIN owns Delhi now, so BRITAIN owns ALL of the Mughals' former vassal states by way of inheritance"); in which he extensively boasted about how "On the one hand I averted from an amiable and harmless people the oppressive weight of Sikh exaction and insolence, and on the other I secured for my country an influence over a state (Ladakh) which, lying on the British frontier, offered a central mart for the extension of her commerce to Turkestan and China, and a strong network against an enemy from the north, should such a foe ever occur in the autocrat of the Russians".
The highest Sikh estimates for its population (exceeding 20-25%) came from Charles Metcalfe, who when serving in the post of envoy to the court of Ranjit Singh in Lahore in 1808-09, began a relationship with a Punjabi Sikh woman; which he continued to openly maintain throughout his tenure in India, but was deemed 'illegitimate' in the BEIC's official records, along with the three sons she bore him (all of whom were sent back to England to receive formal educations), solely on the grounds that the couple were only ever formally wed in a Sikh marriage ceremony. These came directly from the Lahore Darbar itself (but were only trustworthy with regards to the Majha region, which constitutes the Sikh heartland); with Metcalfe having only retired from service with the East India Company in 1838 and returned in England afterwards, since his Sikh Punjabi wife had died in that year.
And the lowest Muslim estimates (50%), along with some of the highest Sikh (20%) and Hindu (30%) estimates, came from Alexander Burnes, collected in the course of his expedition up the valley of the Indus River in 1829 and further travels in the Sikh Empire and surrounding territories up until the Ropar Summit in Oct 1831; with this being attributable to his differing methodology (which he chose since it was the prevailing view among those local commonfolk, leaders and governors whom he'd spoken to on his travels through the region, accompanied only by Ensign J.D. Leckie, with members of native local communities periodically enlisted to man and navigate his convoy). Alexander Burnes categorized all Nanakpanthis as being 'Sikhs', rather than Hindus (hence his estimation of Shikarpur/Upper Sindh's population being 50% Sikh already at that time), as did most people in the Sikh Empire, and those farther down the Indus in Talpur Sindh at this time; with the Sikh Empire's success having greatly increased the associated prestige of identifying as a Sikh rather than a Hindu. And he also categorized all Sufis as 'Hindus'; since they were decried as such, and thereby excluded from the definition of 'Muslim' as cited by all Sunni and Sh'ia Muslims, who themselves collectively comprised the majority of the Muslim population.
As such, it's ironically the last of these religious demographic estimates that'll probably have been the most relevant and important in a 'Sikh Imperial' TL, since it was how the general public typically broke things down and divided them up themselves at the time (even if the respective clergies, and the aristocracy at the Lahore Darbar, greatly disagreed), and thus represents the bar for how plausible it'd be to maintain religious stability and prevent civil unrest on sectarian religious grounds.
Because the 'Martial Tribes' edict changed them from a religious to a racial/ethnic group when they'd never been one previously, thereby plateauing out their growth rate relative to the general population at that early juncture (with the Sikhs' markedly higher-than-average literacy and education levels subsequently reducing their relative share of the population from then onwards, on account of their birth rates being lower than the average for the general population). And also because the main religious body of the Sikh Khalsa at Amritsar became increasingly exclusionist, racist and elitist under the rule of the British Raj as a result, to the extent where the official Sikh clergy of the Harmandir Sahib (Golden Temple) in Amritsar conferred upon Colonel Dyer the Saropa (robe of honor, the mark of distinguished service to the Sikh faith, or to humanity in general) as a reward for having perpetrated the Amritsar Massacre, as well as formally proclaiming him and Capt. Briggs to have been invested into the brotherhood of the Khalsa with a 'special exemption' from having to follow any of the 5 K’s.Thanks for the detailed reply. In your opinion, why was it that by the time of the Partition of India, Sikhs were not a majority in any district of British India? They were spread from Peshawar to Delhi with the highest population being in Amritsar, a religious center for them, but even Amritsar had a Muslim plurality.
I’ve come across this claim - that the Sikh Empire had this massive bottom-up literary culture - before, and I have to admit, I just don’t believe it. Punjab in the 19th to late 20th centuries was a place where the elite almost exclusively used Urdu as a literary language and Gurmukhi script was shunted to the side as a Sikh liturgical language. Indeed, many people did not even view Punjabi as a language separate from Hindi/Urdu, and due to its Sikh liturgical usage it got a sectarian cast. Within India, it only gained its position as the leading language in Punjab in the 1960s, and within Pakistan, it still hasn’t.I'm certainly not assuming that the trend of conversion would last forever, or maintain the same exponential growth rate; it'll definitely slow down over time, until it reaches a point where it plateaus out and the Sikh's share of the total population stabilizes. But it's a question of when, and where that increasing share of the total population would level out. And it wasn't just driven by the langar system- the langar system's merely the most enduring and universal of the services provided to the general population by the Gurdwaras, but during the Sikh Imperial period, they offered an awful lot more to the general populace as well. You wanted to learn how to read and write, and become literate? In a (short-lived, IOTL) state-subsidized initiative which was personally championed by Prince Kharak Singh's wife Chand Kaur (Nau Nihal Singh's mother), you could go to any gurdwara in the Sikh Empire and pick up a free alphabet book, regardless of whether you were a man or woman, with it being mandatory to provide these to the bride and groom whenever any weddings took place in them, as well as providing them to any mothers whenever a naming/christening ceremony for a newborn baby was conducted there. Want to put those literacy skills to good use? The majority of Gurdwaras also provided public libraries, not only consisting of Sikh literature, but of other religious texts, secular texts and even works of fiction as well; where people weren't permitted to check out books, but where anyone could come in and read freely, provided they respected Sikh customs (e.g, covered head, no substance abuse) within the temple grounds. And the same went for a bunch of other social services, including clerical work, homeless shelters, and sometimes even basic medical care. I wouldn't have bothered to bring it up if it were just the langar system that they provided; but it was so much more than that.
But this is the thing - it’s a state-sponsored initiative tied to religion. Socialism can become quasi-religious in nature, but it’s not a religion. With state aid being tied to religion in this manner, it is cast as religion, and that can only result in competing religious escalation. Not a recipe for social stability.Was it state sponsored conversion? No more so than state-sponsored social welfare systems should be considered as 'state-sponsored conversion to socialism'. Which isn't to say that reactionaries wouldn't, and didn't, paint it that way- of course they did, and would do so. But those who benefit from such initiatives- who'll always be the 'silent majority' of people, due to inescapable inequalities in wealth distribution- won't ever see it that way. And when the alternatives are either 'we'll provide support, but only if you're from a sufficiently high caste, otherwise begone inferior filth'; 'we'll provide support, but only if you renounce all your heathen cultural and religious practices and convert to Islam first, otherwise we're religiously obligated to enslave you or kill you, seeing as how you're a kafir and all', or 'we'll offer our support to everyone irrespective of their culture, religion or gender, so long as you respect our faith and others' whilst you're under our roof, and you're definitely not obligated to convert to Sikhism if you partake of our aid, but it'd be polite to at least consider it, and we'd be really happy if you did convert', it's pretty obvious and self-explanatory why the latter held the most appeal.
Thanks, that’s very helpful. The last one does seem the most accurate, though I do still wonder about the precise boundaries between Sikhism and Hinduism. On the other hand, Ranjit Singh may have celebrated Navratri (or was he doing so for his Hindu subjects’ benefit), the Dasam Granth which today is deemphasized because too much of it seems Hindu (including an account of Durga killing Mahishasura) was widely read, and many Sikhs of the era read the Ramcharitmanas that serves as the main holy book among Hindus in much of the Hindi belt, so perhaps “normative” Sikhism would be Hindu-tinted relative to OTL, which would allow for broader definitions of Sikhism.On that related note though, those religious demographic estimates for the Sikh Empire do indeed vary wildly. And this can primarily be attributed to the fact that the different BEIC employees who conducted and/or compiled the scouting surveys which came up with these estimates
This is not true. Sikhism has always been led by upper-caste people, despite its lofty egalitarian ideals. All of the human Gurus belonged to the merchant and administrative Khatri caste, and similarly you can see that pattern of dominance of leadership up to the 18th century. What changed then was which caste was on the top, as over the 18th and 19th centuries the landowning Jat caste converted to Sikhism and gradually came to hold a position of leadership. But Khatris were able to maintain a position of substantive but not uncontested leadership up until after Partition, which devastated them and dispersed them across India and in its wake the Jat caste became dominant, with their form of Sikhism becoming normative.During the Colonial Raj, Sikhism was explicitly typecast and entrenched as members of an upper caste/class racial/ethnic group, rather than the explicitly anti-caste egalitarianist movement it'd been prior to this.
Great reply.This is not true. Sikhism has always been led by upper-caste people, despite its lofty egalitarian ideals. All of the human Gurus belonged to the merchant and administrative Khatri caste, and similarly you can see that pattern of dominance of leadership up to the 18th century. What changed then was which caste was on the top, as over the 18th and 19th centuries the landowning Jat caste converted to Sikhism and gradually came to hold a position of leadership. But Khatris were able to maintain a position of substantive but not uncontested leadership up until after Partition, which devastated them and dispersed them across India and in its wake the Jat caste became dominant, with their form of Sikhism becoming normative.
Now, a lot of things did change with this change of caste leadership, as Khatris are urban and merchant/administrative, while Jats are rural and landowning. So the nature of caste dominance changed a lot. But Sikh history shouldn’t be viewed in this rose-tinted lens.
I’ve come across this claim - that the Sikh Empire had this massive bottom-up literary culture - before, and I have to admit, I just don’t believe it. Punjab in the 19th to late 20th centuries was a place where the elite almost exclusively used Urdu as a literary language and Gurmukhi script was shunted to the side as a Sikh liturgical language. Indeed, many people did not even view Punjabi as a language separate from Hindi/Urdu, and due to its Sikh liturgical usage it got a sectarian cast. Within India, it only gained its position as the leading language in Punjab in the 1960s, and within Pakistan, it still hasn’t.
Now, the way I’ve seen the line crossed between these two very different Punjabs is that the Britishers destroyed all these libraries, books, qaidas etc. and left nothing in its wake. But if this is true, then surely they would have passed some trace of this literary culture to their kids, and it would have been quite impossible for Urdu to gain its position as the predominant script of Punjab. As such, I find it hard to believe that Punjab had this massive literary culture. Which isn’t to say that it didn’t have some sort of one, but it looks to me like it has been exaggerated.
But this is the thing - it’s a state-sponsored initiative tied to religion. Socialism can become quasi-religious in nature, but it’s not a religion. With state aid being tied to religion in this manner, it is cast as religion, and that can only result in competing religious escalation. Not a recipe for social stability.
Thanks, that’s very helpful. The last one does seem the most accurate, though I do still wonder about the precise boundaries between Sikhism and Hinduism. On the other hand, Ranjit Singh may have celebrated Navratri (or was he doing so for his Hindu subjects’ benefit), the Dasam Granth which today is deemphasized because too much of it seems Hindu (including an account of Durga killing Mahishasura) was widely read, and many Sikhs of the era read the Ramcharitmanas that serves as the main holy book among Hindus in much of the Hindi belt, so perhaps “normative” Sikhism would be Hindu-tinted relative to OTL, which would allow for broader definitions of Sikhism.
This is not true. Sikhism has always been led by upper-caste people, despite its lofty egalitarian ideals. All of the human Gurus belonged to the merchant and administrative Khatri caste, and similarly you can see that pattern of dominance of leadership up to the 18th century. What changed then was which caste was on the top, as over the 18th and 19th centuries the landowning Jat caste converted to Sikhism and gradually came to hold a position of leadership. But Khatris were able to maintain a position of substantive but not uncontested leadership up until after Partition, which devastated them and dispersed them across India and in its wake the Jat caste became dominant, with their form of Sikhism becoming normative.
Now, a lot of things did change with this change of caste leadership, as Khatris are urban and merchant/administrative, while Jats are rural and landowning. So the nature of caste dominance changed a lot. But Sikh history shouldn’t be viewed in this rose-tinted lens.