Remnant of Dina Nath Garden

Reference of Article and information Majid Shikeh (Dawn Newspaper)

07-10-2018

Who was Dina Nath? Well … he was the most important man in the Sikh era who quietly behind the scenes controlled all the money collected in the reign of Maharajah Ranjit Singh, and later till Sikh rule ended in 1849. He designed the revenue collection system of Punjab, which it must be said even the British studied and applied when imposing their codified rules. In this piece we will talk about the man, his role in the rule of Lahore, and about his disputed legacy.

Dina Nath Madan was born in 1795 in the Chowdhary Bagh area of Rainawari Mohallah in Srinagar. He belonged to a family of Kashmiri pandits and his family used the name ‘Razdan’ when writing. The Razdan pandits in pre-Partition Lahore were among the leading families of the city. In 1815 following the Dogra massacres he moved from Srinagar to Delhi and worked as a finance and accountancy person. Dina Nath was related to Diwan Ganga Ram Raina, the head of military accounts of the Lahore Darbar, and he introduced the young Dina Nath to the maharaja who appointed him a ‘mutsaddi’, or final writer of accounts. The accuracy and clarity of his work soon became well known and when Diwan Ganga Ram died in 1826, the 31-year old Dina Nath was made head of military accounts.

Eight years later when Diwan Bhavani Das, the head of civil accounts, died, Dina Nath took over as head of both military and civil accounts. His command over his work led him to be made a Diwan in 1838.

During his life he built three ‘havelis’ inside the walled city, as also a beautiful garden near Mughalpura just to the West of the ‘samadhi’ of Maharajah Sher Singh in Kot Khawaja Saeed. That garden, which after 1947 has been heavily encroached upon by influential land-grabbers, was where he had a small ‘haveli’ and in that died Raja Dina Nath. The ancestors of Raja Dina Nath retain their original name of ‘Madan’ and still use the pen name of ‘Razdan’. 

Shrine of Shah Bilawal Built inside the Dina Naath Garden

 *Shah Bilawal s/o Syed Usman s/o Syed Isa migrated to this area with Mughal Emperor Humyoon from Herat and settled at a place where now Sheikhupura Fort is situated and shifted here in the period of Mughal Emperor Akber. He was died in 1636 A.d at an age of seventy years. in the period of Maharaja Ranjeet Singh river Ravi changed its course and the dead body of this saint was shifted and reburied adjacent to Raja Dina Nath's garden.The corpse was as fresh after 200 years witnessed hundreds of people.

After sometime river Ravi again change the course there is also a tomb constructed at that location.