Sheikhupura is an industrial city in the northwest of Punjab province, Pakistan. The city is also the administrative headquarter of the Sheikhupura district and is approximately 38 km from Punjab’s provincial capital, Lahore. The town is famous for its historical monuments and also known as the city of Mughals, where emperors come for hunting. The city is also well-known for its booming industry.
The history of Sheikhupura goes back to 1000 BC. Historical research has established the fact that Sangla or Sakala was the capital of Punjab once, and it was here that Alexander the Great of Macedonia (Sikandar-e-Azam) in 325BC fought one of his most serious battles of his career. Its name is spoken of, firstly in the pages of Tuzk-e-Jahangiri as Jahangirpura, after the name of Prince Salim Nur-ud-din Muhammad Jahangir. Mughal Emperor Jahangir granted the estate of Sheikhupura to Syed Usman, the father of Shah Bilal, a religious preceptor of the line of Qadiriyyah.
Over the whole district, the period between the decline of Mughal Empire after the death of Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb and the rise of Sikh confederacies was one of utter confusion and anarchy. The successive shocks of invasion from the northwest, and the devastation caused again and again by the invading armies of Nadir Shah.
Finally around 1780, Ranjit Singh, a sikh ruler defeated the grandson of Ahmad Shah Abdali and later captured this district. The sikhs were routed by the British around 1850 and it stayed under British rule till independence in 1947.
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