1 HSTOIIV OP 5 THE SIKHS,
2 153
3 boy of eight years of age, in the hands of his mother
4 and the Dewan, and under the control of his mother-
5 in-law Suda Koonwur, one of the most artful and
6 ambitious women who figure in Sikh history. The
7 mother of Runjeet Singh was aided in the govern¬
8 ment of the Missul by Lukput Singh, her husband’s
9 dewan, with whom she was on terms of undue inti¬
10 macy ; but on Runjeet attaining the years of man-
11 hood, he threw off the thraldom of this man and
12 his mother; and the latter, it was supposed, was
13 poisoned. It appears further, that the favours of
14 the Queen-regent were not exclusively confined to
15 Lukput Singh; and from all accounts, we are to
16 conclude, that both the mother and wife of Runjeet The abandon-
17 9 e d character
18 Singh were abandoned characters. The Mahar&- of w» wife and
19 jah was a second time married to Raj Koonwur, His second
20 the daughter of Khujan Singh, the Nukee chief;
21 and his third wife was the present Ranee of Lahore,
22 and .supposed mother of Dhuleep Singh.
23 The mother ©f Mehtab Koonwur, the first wife
24 of Runjeet Singh, as already stated, was anxious to
25 connect herself with the family of Maha Singh, who
26 was a rising man: and as she knew that on the
27 death of her father-in-law Jye Singh, the posses¬
28 sions of the powerful Missul, the Gbuneeya, would
29 fall into her hands, she thought, by getting the m politic
30 control of the youthful Runjeet, she might easily Koonwur.
31 subject the Punjab to her own dominion. She ap¬
32 peared to calculate with certainty regarding the
33 results, for the youthful career of her son-in-law
34 was such as to give every hope of the Ramghureea