Post - Mughal Regional kingdoms
The post-Mughal era was dominated by the rise of the Maratha suzerainty as other small regional states, post-Mughal tributary states, and the increasing activities of European powers and the eventual collapse of the Marathas led to the British annexation of South Asia.
The Kingdom of Mysore
The Kingdom of Mysore was a kingdom of southern India, which was founded around 1400 AD by the Wodeyar dynasty. The rule of the Wodeyars was interrupted by Hyder Ali and his son Tippu Sultan. Under their rule Mysore fought a series of wars sometimes against the combined forces of the British and Marathas, but mostly against the British with some aid or promise of aid from the French.
After the death of Tippu Sultan in the Fourth War of Mysore in 1799, the Wodeyar dynasty regained limited power as a Princely State under the British. The Kingdom of Mysore became part of the modern day, Indian state of Karnataka.
The Hyderabad State
Hyderabad and Berar under the Nizam's, was a princely state in India. It was located in south-central India from 1724 until 1948, ruled by a hereditary Nizam, and an Indian state from 1948 to 1956. Its capital city Hyderabad was for most of that time one of India's four largest cities.
The Punjab
The Punjabi kingdom, ruled by members of the Sikh religious movement was a political entity that ruled the region of modern day Punjab. Founded by the ten Gurus of the Sikh faith, it expanded its borders during the reign of Maharaja Ranjit Singh at the height of the Sikh Empire to include surrounding areas like Kashmir, Peshawar, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, and was among the last areas of the subcontinent that was conquered by the British. The Anglo-Sikh wars marked the downfall of the Sikh Empire.
Afghanistan
In 1748, the Afghan leader Ahmed Shah Abdali crossed the Indus River on the pretext of waging a jihad against the "Hindus". He attacked Lahore (in present day Pakistan) in 1750, his first Indian target. Subsequently, he raided the rest of the Punjab (including Amritsar), Kashmir and finally Delhi. He also fought against the Marathas frequently. He left India with numerous treasures, including the Kohinoor diamond.
Gorkha kingdom
It was around the 18th century that modern Nepal, formerly part of several empires such as the Mauryans, was formed by Gorkha rulers, who conquered the Katmandu valley. During later colonial rule, Nepal was made a puppet state of Great Britain, rather than annexed like other princely states, in part due to the use of Gurkhas in the British and British Indian armies.
*This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "History of India".