of the  Gakkhars  until Muqarrab Khan, the last  Gakkhar  ruler, was defeated by the Sikhs under  Sardar MilkaSingh  in 1765. Singh invited traders from the neighbouringcommercial centres of  Jhelum  and  Shahpur  to settle in the territory. Early in thenineteenth century Rawalpindi became for a time the refuge of Shah Shuja,the exiled king of Afghanistan, and