Ropar Meeting

The Ropar Meeting in October 1831 was between Maharaja Ranjit Singh and Lord William Bentinck, Governor-General of the East India Company, on the banks of the river Satluj, in a town of the same name. Ranjit Singh's fame had reached its peak, attracting the attention and friendship of sovereigns from afar.

Background

The Ropar Meeting highlighted the camaraderie between Maharaja Ranjit Singh of the Sikh Empire and the East India Company, which governed Hindustan. The grandeur of the Sikh display prompted a British historian to compare it to the Field of the Cloth of Gold.

The agenda of both powers differed significantly. Ranjit Singh aimed to secure recognition for his son, Kharak Singh's accession, and sought the Company's response to his plans to annex Sindh. At the same time, the Company harboured suspicions that Ranjit Singh had initiated communication with Russia. The East India Company was preparing to court him, recognising him as essential to realising it's expanding aspirations for 'rightful influence' and lucrative commerce. It wanted Ranjit Singh to permit trade access through the Indus and Satluj rivers.

The Treaty of Amritsar, signed by Ranjit Singh and the Company in 1809, constrained Sikh expansion south of the Satluj and prevented the Company from extending north of it. Sindh, located south of the Satluj, was a matter of interest due to the flow of the Satluj's waters after it left the Punjab. The Satluj joined the Panjnad before reaching the Indus near Mithankot, at which place it left the Sikh Empire and entered Sindh. The Treaty did not address the issue of territorial control along the Satluj's route to the Arabian Sea. The events following the Ropar Meeting showed that the East India Company misinterpreted the 1809 treaty to suit their own convenience.

In the first half of the nineteenth century, the historical land trade route from the plains of Hindustan to Afghanistan ran through the Sikh Empire. Other overland routes were considered unsafe and circuitous. The East India Company aimed to gain waterway access through Sikh territory to facilitate sea trade from Bombay to Attock via the Indus River. From Attock, goods could be transported up the Kabul River. Caravans would carry the goods through the Khyber Pass to Kabul and to markets in Bokhara, Khorasan, and Iraq, providing competition to Russian goods.

The precursor to the meeting

In April 1831, four months before the Ropar Meeting, Ranjit Singh deputed a mission to Shimla to felicitate the Governor-General. The Sikh delegation was the first foreign mission hosted by Lord Bentinck as Governor-General.

Claude Martin Wade