Wives of Ranjit Singh

Maharaja Ranjit Singh had many wives, possibly around thirty. Furthermore, he kept a company of around twenty-three concubines and a 150 dancing-girls, mostly from Kashmir and the Punjab Hills. The numerous wives were of various ethnic backgrounds, such as Punjabi, Pashtun, and Pahari, and also various caste-backgrounds, such as Jatt, Rajput, and Gujjar. The marriages initially helped strengthen the Sukerchakia Misl and later the Sikh Empire, due to marital-alliances to various groups. After Ranjit Singh provided help to Sansar Chand of Kangra against the invading Gurkhas, he married two of the Kangra ruler's daughters. At-least five of his wives were Muslim.

Recent scholarship has argued that historians' focus on the Maharaja has hidden the political role of "the ruling women and young princes of Ranjit Singh's new royal house", who in fact had a strong influence on the Sikh Empire. A 2021 novel by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni titled The Last Queen tells the story of Ranjit Singh's last wife, Jind Kaur, and interweaves stories of the other wives in the zenana, including Rani Guddan, Chand Kaur and Pathani.

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