The Sikh religion began around the time of the conquest of Northern Indian subcontinent by Babur, the founder of the Mughal Empire. Finally, by 1849 the state was dissolved after the defeat in the Second Anglo-Sikh War.Д«ackground Mughal rule of Punjab After the death of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, the empire was weakened by internal divisions and political mismanagement. He began to modernise his army, using the latest training as well as weapons and artillery. Ranjit Singh rose to power in a very short period, from a leader of a single misl to finally becoming the Maharaja of Punjab. Sahib Singh Bedi, a descendant of Guru Nanak, conducted the coronation. Ranjit Singh was proclaimed as Maharaja of the Punjab on 12 April 1801 (to coincide with Vaisakhi), creating a unified political state. The formation of the empire began with the capture of Lahore, by Maharaja Ranjit Singh, from its Afghan ruler, Zaman Shah Durrani, and the subsequent and progressive expulsion of Afghans from the Punjab, by defeating them in the Afghan-Sikh Wars, and the unification of the separate Sikh misls. However, in the period from 1762 to 1799, Sikh commanders of the misls appeared to be coming into their own as independent. Each of these component armies controlled different areas and cities. This led to a growth of the army which split into different confederacies or semi-independent misls. With the Mughals significantly weakened, the Sikh army, known as the Dal Khalsa, a rearrangement of the Khalsa inaugurated by Guru Gobind Singh, led expeditions against them and the Afghans in the west. The foundations of the Sikh Empire can be traced to as early as 1707, the year of Aurangzeb's death and the start of the downfall of the Mughal Empire. Religiously diverse, with an estimated population of 3.5 million in 1831 (making it the 19th most populous country at the time), it was the last major region of the Indian subcontinent to be annexed by the British Empire. It was divided into four provinces: Lahore, in Punjab, which became the Sikh capital Multan, also in Punjab Peshawar and Kashmir from 1799 to 1849. At its peak in the 19th century, the Empire extended from the Khyber Pass in the west to western Tibet in the east, and from Mithankot in the south to Kashmir in the north.

It was forged on the foundations of the Khalsa from a collection of autonomous Sikh misls. The empire existed from 1799, when Maharaja Ranjit Singh captured Lahore, to 1849, when it was defeated and conquered in the Second Anglo-Sikh War. The Sikh Empire ( Persian: ШіШ±Ъ©Ш§Ш±Щђ Ш®Ш§Щ„ШµЩ‡, romanized: SarkДЃr-Д“-KhДЃlsДЃ, lit.'Government of the Khalsa' Punjabi: аЁёаЁїа©±аЁ– аЁ–аЁјаЁѕаЁІаЁёаЁѕ аЁ°аЁѕаЁњ ( Gurmukhi), ШіЪ©Ъѕ Ш®Ш§Щ„ШµШ§ Ш±Ш§Ш¬ ( Shahmukhi), romanized: Sikkh KhДЃlsДЃ RДЃj, lit.'Sikh Khalsa rule'), also known as the Punjab Empire, was a state originating in the Indian subcontinent, formed under the leadership of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, who established an empire based in the Punjab.

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