Gakhars

The Gakhars, (also Gakkhar or Ghakhar or Ghakkar) (Urdu: گاکھر) are an ancient aristocratic and warlike clan now located in Rawalpindi, Islamabad, Jhelum, Kashmir, Gilgit, Baltistan (Tibet), Chitral, and Khanpur (NWFP) regions in modern day Pakistan. [1] The Gakkars were one of the dominant tribal peoples who stood as the western bulwark of the Northwest fromtier territories during the first Muslim invasions into the Punjab and India.

The first written record of them has them winning from the Hindu Raja of Lahore territories in the area NWPF. This treaty assigned them the defense of Punjab and India from the earliest invasions of Islam. In the year 1008 Mahmud of Ghazni in one attack lost 5,0000 soldiers in a matter of minutes to a Gakkar attack. Eventually they were over ran and forced to convert to Islam though they maintained a certain amount of independance. For joining with Mamud they were rewarded with the Kingdom of Potohar on the Pothohar Plateau.

Later they were loyal vassals of Babur and his Mughal Dynasty.But the tide would turn against them as their territories were taken over by Maharaja Ranjit Singh in 1810. After the Death of the Maharaja and the defeats of the Anglo-Sikh wars the Gakhars were able once again to claim their pahari homelands bordering Jammu & Kashmir.

After several military attempts by the Afganis who had once ruled part of the Gakkar homelands in the NWFP, as well as much of Panjab, before the rise of Kingdom of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, a toehold was finally gained by a marriage between a daughter of Sher Ali Khan the ruler of Afganistan and one of the Ghakkar rulers Khan Bahadur Raja Jahandad Khan.

Reference

[1] wikipedia / The Gakhars [1]