Massa Ranghar was put in charge of Amritsar by the Lahore administration and used the Harmandir as a place of entertainment, with dancers and tobacco, at a time when Sikhs could not approach the town.
Bhai Mehtab Singh of Mirankot and Bhai Sukha Singh of Mari Kambo rode to Amritsar in 1740, disguised as revenue collectors with bags of broken pottery for coin, entered the building, killed Massa Ranghar, took his head and rode out.
They rode to Bikaner and the head was displayed as proof.
Bhai Mehtab Singh was later captured and executed at Lahore on the wheel.
It is the eighteenth century's best known single action and it is a two-man raid on an occupied shrine two hundred kilometres inside hostile territory.
The use Massa Ranghar made of the Darbar Sahib is described in the Sikh accounts as the keeping of dancing girls and the smoking of tobacco within the precincts. The Persian sources do not mention the episode at all.
The two rode from Bikaner, where a body of Sikhs had taken refuge, and entered Amritsar disguised as revenue payers carrying bags of money. The detail of the disguise is the fixed element of the story in every retelling.
Bhai Mehtab Singh Ji returned to the Majha and was taken some years later at Lahore. Bhai Sukha Singh Ji was killed in action in 1752. Both are named in the standard martyrologies and both have shrines in their villages.