Sardar Ranjit Singh Of Kalsia was born in 1882 ,he was the second son of Sardar Bishen Singh. Heaving succeeded to the Kalsia  State on May 16, 1888, he was privately educated at home, by English and Persian tutors. On the recommendation of the Commissioner at Ambala, he was enrolled at Aitchison College, Lahore. However, his mother was unhappy, and wanted her son brought closer to home. She succeeded and he continued his studies at Nahan (Himachal Pradesh) under the watchful guidance of Raja Shamsher Prakash.

During his minority, the administration of Kalsia State, was under the direct control of the Commissioner of Delhi, while the local administration was carried out by the Kalsia State Council. During the Chitral and Tirah Campaigns of 1895, Sardar Ranjit Singh offered Rs 100,000 towards the war expenses, providing transport and other goods and services to the British forces. Again the Kalsia Chief offered his services during the Boer Wars in South Africa of 1899, by providing the British Government with twenty-five horses with accessories, worth over Rs 30,000 and Rs 5,000 to be offered as compensation for the wounded. In 1900, his charitable donations were further appreciated when he donated Rs 2,500 on two occasions, towards the Transvaal War Relief Fund and the Lamden Horse Fund. On February 16,1895, aged thirteen, he married Bibi Ranbir Kaur, daughter of Raja Balbir Singh of Jind, but after five years of marriage and unable to produce an heir, Sardar Ranjit Singh married again, to Basant Kaur, daughter of Sardar Ganda Singh of Deepnagar, Patiala. He attended the Delhi Durbar of 1903, which commemorated the accession of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandria to the British throne, spending over Rs 30,000 in preparing for his attendance at the Delhi Durbar. In 1906, he was finally granted the authority to rule over his state at the age of twenty-three. His first wife, Ranbir Kaur, gave birth to a daughter, Rajendra Kaur in 1905, and coincidentally a few days later, his second wife, Basant Kaur, also gave birth to a daughter, Khurd Kaur. He died on July 24, 1908, from effects of acute diarrhoea while visiting his family in Mussoorie. He was succeeded by his only son H.H Raja Ravi Sher Singh Of Kalsia.

Leave a comment

error: Alert: Content is protected !!