At the time the army was viewed as the premier fighting force of all of Asia. The army was responsible and answerable to Maharaja Ranjit Singh with very strong commitments to the Guru of the Sikhs the Guru Granth Sahib. The Sikh Khalsa Army was responsible for land warfare, land defence, and all responsibilities for the protection of the Sikh Empire's political institutions and national security. The army of the empire was called the Dal Khalsa until Maharaja Ranjit Singh came to power and it was renamed the Sikh Khalsa Army.

Despite only being a tiny proportion of the area's population the Sikhs rose to power against unseemable odds, the religious demographics of the Sikh Empire show that 80% was Muslim, with 10% Hindu and 10% Sikh. During the time before Maharaja Ranjit Singh's sucession to ruler the areas was attacked frequently by Ahmed Shah Abdali and Nadir Shah but the Sikhs were a strong collaboration and would grow stronger and stronger in defence of such attacks, the time is remembered as a heroic century. The Empire was subject to the governance of the Sarbat Khalsa, a biannual gathering of the Khalsa Panth in Amritsar. The jewel in the crown of the empire was that of Punjab or land of the five rivers, the Beas, Ravi Sutlej, Chenab and Jhelum, which are all tributaries of the Indus river. This area can be seen on the map below, click to see the large view. The Empire covered a region between the modern People's Republic of China and Afghanistan, encompassing the following modern day regions: The cities of Lahore and Amritsar served as a dual capital. The country was a democracy until 1801 when it became a fully organised militiarised monarchy with civil liberities for the people. Although the empire came under the power of Maharaja Ranjit Singh upon his coronation in 1799, the Sikhs had ruled these lands since 1716 as a collection of autonomous Misls (or fighting clans) that were governed by barons/Misldars.

The Sikh Empire was a country that existed from 1799 (exactly 100 years after Guru Gobind Singh had created the Khalsa) til 1849.

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