LOWER CHENAB Colony people received twice as much land as those handed over to settlers in Rachna Doab. In the book 'Five Punjabi Centuries' the article on canal colonization and economic change we have the following accounts on the Lower Chenab Colony.

It was the immigrant grantees whom the British expected to be the backbone of the colony. They were to be chosen from among skilled agriculturists belonging to landholding lineages. They were to come from districts suffering from high population densities, and thereby relieve economic pressures in these areas. The British selected seven districts from central Punjab for recruiting such grantees. These were Ambala, Amritsar, Gurdaspur, Hoshiarpur, Jalandhar, Ludhiana and Sialkot. Of these, Amritsar was the largest recipient, with over 250,000 acres allotted, while Gurdaspur and Sialkot obtained around 150,000 acres, and the others except Ambala got over 100,000 acres each. Other Punjab districts were also allotted smaller areas of land, but over 80% of land allocated for immigrant grantees went to the seven selected districts. It was in these districts that the Sikh population was also concentrated.

In terms of the social composition of the grantees, the British kept land allocation almost entirely for the landholding 'agricultural castes'. Richer non-agriculturists could obtain land at auction or as 'capitalist' grantees; but the poorer classes were generally excluded from land occupancy. The largest area of land was allotted to immigrant Jats, who got 675,000 acres, of which 230,000 acres went to Muslims and the rest to Hindus and Sikhs. The Arians, who were all Muslims, stood second with around 200,000 acres. Among other Hindu and Sikh castes to receive land (figures were not disaggregated for these two communities), the most prominent were Kambohs, Sainis and Rajputs. Clearly, a very sizeable intake of Sikh settlers from the central Punjab occurred in the Rachna Doab. Whenever possible, grantees from the same clan or sub-caste, or from the same district, were settled in a village. This helped to preserve social cohesion and traditional relationships. Grantees also brought with them their jajmani servitors, thus reproducing in the canal colonies the social organization of the older villages. Economic change turned out to be deeply rooted in social continuities.

The access to new and valuable economic resources led to a considerable strengthening of the upper stratum of rural society. There was a consequent weakening in the position of the rural poor and landless. Through the transfer of land, British imperialism was cementing its bonds with, and helping to consolidate the position of, those who were already dominant. Moreover, the central Punjab districts, and even more specifically the castes selected for grantees, were also heavily involved with military recruitment. These castes also formed the backbone of the Sikh component in the British Indian army. Since the major portion of soldiers in the army came from the Punjab, military considerations continued to be an important underlying influence on land utilization in the canal colonies. Indeed, they were also to become a major, overt imperative in colonization policy. In Lower Chenab Colony 15,000 acres were reserved for ex-soldiers on the two earlier branches, the Rakh and Jhang. On the Gugera Branch the amount was raised to 70,000 acres, or almost 10% of allotted land in this tract. The military's stake was to grow even further in later colonies.

An intriguing illustration of the link between the military and landed status occurred with the allocation of three villages in Lower Chenab Colony to ex-soldiers of the 23rd, 30th and 34th pioneer regiments. The recipients were not from the agricultural castes, as with other pensioner grants. Instead they were lower caste Mazhbi Sikhs, who had sought service in these regiments. The Mazhbis as a community were regarded by the British as undisciplined and prone to crime. Grants of land to those who had opted for military service was an inducement to other more recalcitrant Mazhbis to reform. In 1911 the Mazhbi grantees were accorded agricultural caste status in Lyallpur and Gujranwala districts, a status not enjoyed by Mazhbi Sikhs anywhere else in the Punjab.

In the project that followed, Lower Jhelum colony, the military presence was for more pervasive. Developed between 1902 and 1906, the colony was situated in Shahpur district, with its headquarters in the newly founded town of Sargodha. Like its predecessors, the colony was originally intended to be settled with civilian colonists, to be drawn from the north western Punjab, a predominantly Muslim region. The feeling had grown that too much land had passed to the central Punjab and to non-Muslims. The new colony was seen as an opportunity to rectify this imbalance. Grantees had even begun to be selected when a dramatic change in colonization policy occurred.

Based on the report in 1901 of a horse and mule-breeding commission, the Government of India demanded that colony grantees should henceforth be required to breed and maintain mules and horses for the military. The report of the commission coincided with the opening up of lower Jhelum colony, and this availability of new land came to be regarded as an ideal opportunity to implement the change in policy, and meet goals.