teenager, Ranjit Singh took hardly any interest in the affairs of the state, making his mother, Raj Kaur, anxious for his future. She felt that marriage might bring him around to the responsibilities of life. She approached Sada Kaur to fix the muklawa (tradition where the wife goes back to her maternal home) date. Ranjit was fifteen years old when he left Gujranwala for Batala, the chief town of the Kanhaiyas, to perform the after marriage rituals with Mehtab Kaur in 1796. This alliance between the two important Sikh families was a major event for Punjab. All the leading Sikh chiefs were present at the wedding. Mehtab Kaur was very beautiful and her looks made her seem mismatched for the rugged Ranjit Singh. Even if Mehtab Kaur could reconcile herself to her husband's looks, it must have been difficult for her to forget that her father was killed in battle with Ranjit Singh's father. Plus she was haughty and self-willed, a proud woman born to rich parents while Ranjit Singh was a typically simple Punjabi man, rustic in his habits. It was a marriage of convenience for both and they rarely stayed together. After entering into a matrimonial alliance with the Kanhaiya Misl, Ranjit Singh wanted to consolidate his position further which could only be done by drawing some other misl to his side. He made suggestions to head of the Nakais and early in 1797 took a second wife, who was the sister of the Nakai Sardar Gyan Singh Sandhu- with whom he was betrothed to for some time. The marriage turned out to be more successful than the first. His second wife bore his mother's name: Raj Kaur. She was renamed Datar Kaur and was warmly known as Mai Nakain and turned into Ranjit's most loved wife. Ranjit's second marriage and his little interest in her gave Mehtab Kaur an excuse to return to Batala. From there on she made only occasional appearances at her husband's home and Ranjit Singh irregularly visited her in Batala. The second marriage took place under the guardianship of Raj Kaur and Sada Kaur in 1792; Sada Kaur accommodated herself to Ranjit's second marriage as she had set her heart on greater and better things. She made laid out plans which Ranjit Singh followed, she hoped to use her influence on him to secure the future of her daughter, her future children as