Jammu Duggar · Western Himalaya & Trans-Himalaya
Duggar's history is the history of small states, and its dates are theirs. There is no imperial dynasty here: what the Persian and Mughal records describe is a cluster of hill chieftaincies — Jammu, Jasrota, Basohli, Bandralta, Mankot, Chenani and their neighbours, conventionally counted as twenty-two — that paid tribute downhill and fought each other uphill. Its medieval period therefore has no single opening date and closes not with any conquest of India but in 1808, when Ranjit Singh annexed Jammu and the hill states became Lahore's tributaries. Its modern period begins on 16 March 1846, and it begins the opposite way round from most of India: by the Treaty of Amritsar a Dogra chieftaincy of these ridges acquired Kashmir and became the ruling house of one of the largest princely states in the subcontinent. From that day Duggar was not a place that was ruled from elsewhere but the seat from which somewhere else was ruled, which is why 1857 reads differently here than in the plains — the Jammu state sent troops in support of the Company — and why organised politics here begins in the 1920s over service, land and subjecthood rather than over empire.
Periodisation is regional, not national — the medieval period does not begin in the same century here as it does elsewhere in India.
The gravel apron below the Shivaliks has been settled far longer than the hill states suggest. Manda, on the Chenab near Akhnoor, has yielded Harappan-period material and is among the northernmost sites of that horizon, sited where the river leaves the hills. At Ambaran a few kilometres away, a Buddhist monastic site with stupa remains and terracotta heads records the Kushana and Gupta centuries, when this shelf lay on the road between the Punjab plain and the Kashmir passes. The temple record begins later and in stone: the groups at Babor and Krimchi belong to roughly the eighth to twelfth centuries and are the oldest standing architecture in the region. The name itself first appears in writing outside the region — a Chamba copper-plate charter of the eleventh century refers to Durgara, the earliest recorded form behind Dogra.
| When | What happened |
|---|---|
| c. 2000 BCE | Manda, on the Chenab near Akhnoor, is occupied; its lowest levels carry Harappan-period material, making it one of the northernmost sites of that horizon. |
| c. 1st–6th century CE | The Buddhist monastic site at Ambaran near Akhnoor is in use, leaving stupa remains and terracotta sculpture of the Kushana and Gupta periods. |
| c. 8th–12th century | The stone temple groups at Babor and Krimchi are built, the oldest standing structures in the region. |
| 11th century | A Chamba copper-plate charter records the name Durgara, the earliest written form behind the word Dogra. |
| undated tradition | Local tradition ascribes the founding of Jammu to Raja Jambulochan, who is said to have seen a tiger and a goat drinking together at the Tawi and founded a city on the spot. It is tradition, not record. |
This was the age of the hill chieftaincies. Each held a fort on a ridge, a stretch of dun and a revenue in grain, married into its neighbours, and paid tribute to whoever held the Punjab. Their lasting product was not a state but a school of painting: at Basohli, on the Ravi edge, workshops around 1680 produced the first fully formed Pahari style, in hot red grounds with beetle-wing casings set into the paint as jewels, and the illustrated Rasamanjari of 1694 attributed to the painter Devidasa is its landmark. Jammu itself became the largest of the group under Ranjit Dev, whose long reign in the middle of the eighteenth century drew traders and bankers out of a disordered Punjab and made the town a place of deposit. That prosperity attracted the Sikh misls; Jammu was raided in the 1780s and annexed by Ranjit Singh in 1808, ending the independence of the hill states as a group.
| When | What happened |
|---|---|
| 16th–17th century | The hill chieftaincies of the region appear in Mughal revenue records as tributary states, Jammu among them. |
| c. 1678–1693 | Under Raja Kirpal Pal of Basohli the first mature Pahari painting workshops are at work on the Ravi edge. |
| 1694 | The illustrated Rasamanjari attributed to the painter Devidasa is produced at Basohli, the dated landmark of the school. |
| 1728–1780 | The reign of Ranjit Dev at Jammu, under whom the town becomes a refuge for traders and bankers leaving a disturbed Punjab. |
| 1780s | Sikh forces from the Punjab raid and sack Jammu after Ranjit Dev's death and the succession disputes that follow. |
| 1808 | Ranjit Singh annexes Jammu; the hill states become tributaries of Lahore. |
| 1820–1822 | Gulab Singh, in Lahore's service, is granted Jammu as a jagir and invested as its Raja. |
Gulab Singh's rise inverted the region's position. From Jammu his commanders took Kishtwar and Rajouri in the 1820s, and Zorawar Singh's columns took Ladakh between 1834 and 1835 and Baltistan in 1840, so that by the time the First Anglo-Sikh War ended the Jammu house already administered territory far larger than its own hills. The Treaty of Lahore of 9 March 1846 transferred the country between the Beas and the Indus to the Company; a week later, on 16 March, the Treaty of Amritsar transferred Kashmir and the hill country to Gulab Singh against a payment, and a hill chieftaincy became a princely state of some 200,000 square kilometres. The state that followed was Dogra-officered and Jammu-centred, and its nineteenth century was spent extending administration northward — Gilgit, the Kishtwar and Chenab wazarats, a translation and codification effort under Ranbir Singh, and from 1889 a State Council imposed by the British Resident. Politics in the modern sense begins in the 1920s, and it begins over jobs and land: an agitation over the employment of outsiders in state service produced the hereditary State Subject definition of 1927, and after 1931 the state acquired parties, a partly elected Praja Sabha in 1934, and a long argument about responsible government that was still unfinished in 1947.
| When | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1821 | Kishtwar is annexed to Jammu, followed by Rajouri; the Chenab route to Ladakh comes under Dogra control. |
| 1834–1840 | Zorawar Singh's columns, sent from Kishtwar, annex Ladakh and then Baltistan for the Jammu house. |
| 16 March 1846 | The Treaty of Amritsar transfers Kashmir and the intervening hill country to Gulab Singh, creating the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. |
| 1857 | The Jammu state sends troops in support of the Company during the revolt in the plains; the hills themselves see no rising. |
| 1889 | The ruler's powers are transferred to a State Council working under the supervision of the British Resident, and are only gradually restored. |
| 1927 | The hereditary State Subject definition is notified after agitation over the employment of outsiders, restricting state service and land purchase to state subjects. |
| 1931–1934 | The disturbances of 1931 reach Jammu, the Glancy Commission reports in 1932, the state's first parties are formed, and a partly elected Praja Sabha is constituted in 1934. |
Rulers and commanders
The ablest of the pre-Dogra rajas of Jammu. He kept order on the trade road while the Punjab below was in disorder, attracted bankers and merchants to the town, and left Jammu the strongest of the hill states — which is also what made it worth taking after his death.
Dynasty: Jamwal (Dev) line of Jammu. Seat: Jammu
Patron of the workshops in which the Basohli manner took shape — the earliest fully formed Pahari painting, on saturated red grounds with beetle-wing cases set into the surface for jewels. The style travelled from here up the hills to Guler, Chamba and Kangra.
Dynasty: Pal line of Basohli. Seat: Basohli
A Jamwal Rajput who refused to accept Sikh authority after the annexation of Jammu in 1808 and led a long guerrilla resistance against tax collection from the Shivalik ridges, with support from cultivators. He was killed by Sikh troops in the Trikuta hills. Most of what is known of him comes from Dogri ballads rather than from records, and the dates given for his death vary.
Dynasty: Jamwal. Seat: Jagti and the Shivalik hills
Began as a soldier in Ranjit Singh's service, was invested as Raja of Jammu in 1822, and by the Treaty of Amritsar of 1846 acquired Kashmir and the hill country between, founding the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir and the dynasty that ruled it until 1947.
Dynasty: Dogra. Seat: Jammu
Governor of Kishtwar and the commander who took Ladakh in 1834–35 and Baltistan in 1840 for Gulab Singh, extending Dogra authority across the Himalaya before he was killed in western Tibet in December 1841.
Dynasty: Dogra service. Seat: Kishtwar
Minister and later governor in Kashmir, and the author of the Gulabnama, the Persian court history of Gulab Singh's rise. It is a partisan source and the principal one for the period.
Dynasty: Dogra administration. Seat: Jammu and Srinagar
Extended the state's administration northward to Gilgit, had a penal and civil code drawn up for the state, and funded a translation department that produced Persian, Sanskrit and Dogri work. Dogri's printed literature effectively begins with the patronage of his court.
Dynasty: Dogra. Seat: Jammu
Reigned through the period when the British Resident's authority was at its height: his powers were transferred to a State Council in 1889 and restored only in stages. The Jhelum Valley cart road, the state's first modern schools and its irrigation works belong to his reign.
Dynasty: Dogra. Seat: Jammu
The history of Jammu Duggar from ancient through medieval to modern times, and the rulers, commanders and administrators who shaped it. (8)