The city is an industrial centre and satellite town, and is located about 38 km northwest of Lahore.

[5] The city then came to be known by its current name, which derives from Jehangir's nickname Shekhu that was given to him by his mother, wife of Akbar the Great.

[7] He also erected the nearby Hiran Minar, Sheikhpura's most renowned site, between 1607 and 1620 as a monument to his beloved pet deer, Mansiraj, at a time when the area served as a royal hunting ground for the Mughal Emperor.

[10] The large area between the Chenab and Ravi rivers were initially consolidated into a single district with Sheikhupura serving as its first headquarters, until 1851.

[12] The city was spared the large-scale rioting that engulfed Lahore earlier in 1947, and the city's Sikh population did not shift to India before the Radcliffe Line that demarcated the border of the newly independent states of Pakistan and India was announced.