General Sardar Jwala Singh Of Padhania was the son of Sardar Mita Singh Of Padhania ,He was born into Sandhu Jat family , He was a brave and tall Jat man. He received Jagir worth Rs. 1,25,000 at Haripur Goler in Kangra from his father . He was present at the capture of Multan in 1818, and distinguished himself at Mankera, Teri, Kot Kapura and Kashmir; and on one occasion, being in charge of the Attock fort, he gallantly held out, with a few hundred horsemen, against the whole Afghan army. In 1829 he was struck by paralysis; and though he lived till 1835 he was no longer able to serve in the field or to attend at Darbar. His illness is said to have heen brought on in the following manner. The troops occupying the Kangra fort had mutinied; and the Bhatti Jat ruler Ranjit Singh Of Lahore sent Jwala Singh, who was very popular with the army, to induce them to return to their duty. The fort was too strong to reduce, and Jwala Singh was compelled to confine himself to arguments; and, at length, on solemn promises of full par-don, persuaded the mutineers to submit. But the Maharaja cared nothing for the pledged word of Jwala Singh. He put the ringleaders to death, and fined and degraded the other mutineers. This conduct so mortified Jwala Singh, who considered his howour lost, that it brought on the illness from which he never recovered. There is no one of the Sardars whose name is more renowned for generosity and munificence than Jawala Singh. The young daughter of his cousin, Khan Singh, who had died in very embarrassed circum-stances, Jwala Singh adopted as his own. He gave her a large dowry, and is said to have spent upwards of a lakh of rupees upon her marriage. At the commencement of his last illness he distributed an equally large sum of money among the fakis and Brahmans. Nor was he less liberal to strangers than to his own family, as the following story will show. When Prince Sher Singh had failed so signally in his administration of Kashmir, the Maharaja looked about for victims upon whom to avenge the failure. Among others, the principal agent of the Prince, Diwan Baisakha Singh Chamyariwala, was ordered to Lahore.
His accounts were declared fraudulent, and he was fined Rs. 1,25,000 without enquiry into the proofs against him. There is no doubt the fine was deserved, for at that time Kashmir was considered by the Sikh officials as a sheep-fold under the protection of the wolves. But the Diwan proclaimed that he was unable to pay the fine. The Maharaja ordered him to be flogged until he should discover where his wealth was concealed. The unhappy wretch was dragged out of the presence, past the Deorhi or ante-chamber, where were seated Raja Dhian Singh, Jwala Singh and many other chiefs. When Diwan Baisakha Singh saw them, he implored their intercession with the Maharaja, and threw himself before them, crying out ” I am your cow, save me”. But no one took the slightest notice of him, except Sardar Jwala Singh. He listened to the whole story, and then had the courage to go before the Maharaja and beg for the remission of the punishment, offering himself to pay the whole fine. Ranjit Singh consented and, being utterly without the power of appreciating a noble and magnanimous action, recovered the fine to the last rupee from Jwala Singh, whom, as might have been supposed, the Diwan forgot ever to pay. As another instance of his generosity, it may be mentioned that in his ancestral village of Padhana he never took rent or revenue from any of his own, the Sandhu tribe. On the death of General Jwala Singh, the Maharaja resumed the larger portion of his Jagir, for his son Sardar Hardit Singh.
References :-
- Chiefs and families note in Punjab Vol – 1 By L.H Griffin (1940)