Nau Nihal Singh

When Nau Nihal Singh was declared as Maharaja of Sikh Empire, he adopted a son of Kanhaiya Misl, a powerful remaining confederation that remained after all Misls substantially divided with Kanhaiyas undivided. He married with a Kanhaiya girl and lastly he had his biological child. His first heir was his adopted son. He, his father and his grandfather linked with Kanhaiyas.

He was the son of Maharani Chand Kaur and Maharaja Kharak Singh, himself the eldest son and heir of Maharaja Ranjit Singh Sher-e-Panjab and a grandson of Maharani Datar Kaur of the Nakai Misl.

In April 1837 at the age of sixteen he was married to Bibi Sahib Kaur, a daughter of Shaheed Sardar Sham Singh Attariwala (1790–1846) of the village of Attari in Amritsar district of Punjab.

Nau Nihal was raised outside the court politics at Lahore however at the age of eighteen, and forced by his father's incapacity he returned to Lahore. He was instructed to govern in the name of his father under the direction of the vizier, Dhian Singh. When Kharak Singh became gravely ill, the court physician Johann Martin Honigberger noted that despite his father begging him to see him every day, Nau Nihal rarely visited his father.[2]

The Haveli of Nau Nihal Singh is located in Lahore, Pakistan.

Nau Nihal was popular with the royal courtiers and the general public, and was seen as a worthy successor to his father during the latter's sickness. After Kharak Singh died on 5 November 1840, Nau Nihal performed his last rites beside the Ravi River in Lahore. After the ceremony, he started returning to the palace via the Hazuri Bagh, where a massive block of stone from a gate fell upon him and two of his companions.[3] One of the companions - who was a nephew of the prime minister Dhian Singh - died instantly.[4]

According to Alexander Gardner, who was just steps behind Nau Nihal when the incident took place, the prince had sustained only minor injuries during this episode: he was well enough to walk on his own, and agreed to be taken on a stretcher only because of Gardner's insistence.[5] However, when the court physician Johann Martin Honigberger came to attend Nau Nihal in a tent, he observed that the prince's skull had been crushed, and the bedsheet was covered with blood and brain tissue.[4] Dhian Singh insisted that the prince had suffered these injuries during the alleged accident in Hazuri Bagh. Nau Nihal died hours later, although the courtiers did not make this news public until three days later in an attempt to avoid panic.[5] According to Gardner, five artillery men had carried Nau Nihal from Hazuri Bagh to the tent: two of these men died under mysterious circumstances, two went on leave and never re-joined the service, and one disappeared without explanation.[5]

Nau Nihal was cremated on 9 November 1840, and two of his teenage wives died on his funeral pyre as per the sati custom. His eldest wife, who was pregnant, was spared from sati. Another 12-year old wife was spared from sati because of her young age, after the intervention of Nau Nihal's uncle Sher Singh.[6]

After Nau Nihal's death, a court faction proclaimed his uncle Sher Singh as the rightful heir, while another declared his mother Chand Kaur as the ruler. The faction supporting Chand Kaur hoped that Nau Nihal's pregnant wife would give birth to a son.[7] However, the widow gave birth to a stillborn baby six months later, and Sher Singh besieged Lahore with a 70,000-strong army. Ultimately, Chand Kaur agreed to acknowledge Sher Singh's claim to the throne in return for a generous settlement and safe passage, and Sher Singh was crowned on 18 January 1841.[8] A few months later, on 11 June 1842, Chand Kaur's maids killed her by crushing her skull, just like her son had died. While being punished by Prime Minister Dhian Singh, they insisted that they had killed Chand Kaur on Sher Singh's orders.[9]

Nau Nihal Singh had ordered the construction of a bunga (tower) in the complex of Tarn Taran Sahib, one of the Holiest Sikh Shrines in the Majha Region of Punjab Kingdom.