Massa Ranghar

Massa Ranghar, written Masse Khan Ranghar in the Encyclopaedia of Sikhism, was the Mughal-appointed kotwal (chief police officer) of Amritsar who desecrated Sri Harmandir Sahib in 1740 and was killed there by two Sikhs. He was a Ranghar Rajput landlord who had converted to Islam, from the village of Mandiali, 8 km south of Amritsar. Zakariya Khan, the Mughal governor of Lahore from 1726 to 1745, made him kotwal after Qazi Abdur Rahman had died at Sikh hands, and told him not to let Sikhs visit the Harimandar or bathe in its tank. Panthic.org describes him as the headman of Mandially who was put in charge of Sri Darbar Sahib after government forces had taken it.

Instead of guarding the shrine he stationed himself inside the Harimandar and, in the Encyclopaedia's words, “caroused and indulged in revelry with women of ill repute”. Sikh accounts add that he smoked and drank while dancing girls performed, and Panthic.org says he used the parikarma as a stable and the main hall as a dancing room, with armed guards keeping people out.

Key moments

• 1740: news of the desecration reached a Sikh jatha camped in Rajasthan. The Encyclopaedia and Panthic.org place the camp at Jaipur; the Sikh Missionary Society's account says Bikaner. Bhai Mehtab Singh of Mirankot vowed to avenge it, and Bhai Sukha Singh went with him.
• 11 August 1740: the two entered disguised as village revenue officials bringing in the land revenue, carrying bags of broken clay shaped to look like coins. When Massa bent to look, Mehtab Singh struck off his head with a sword. They escaped on horseback before the soldiers understood what had happened.
• Afterwards: Zakariya Khan ordered village headmen to find the culprits. In 1745 an informer betrayed Mehtab Singh at his village; he was taken to Lahore and executed on a charkhari, a wheel set with sharp spikes. Sukha Singh fell in 1753 fighting the Mughal army on the Ravi (Sikh Missionary Society).

What he is remembered for. Sikh tradition remembers him as the official who turned the holiest shrine of the Panth into a place of revelry while the state hunted Sikhs, and the killing as the Khalsa's answer to beadbi at Sri Harmandir Sahib. Bhai Mehtab Singh and Bhai Sukha Singh are remembered as Shaheeds. Accounts differ in details such as where the jatha was camped.