[6] According to Syed Ali, Sudhans have a Pashtun descent and moved to the Poonch district of Kashmir region some centuries ago.

[3] Scholar Iffat Malik of the Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad writes: The Sudhans claim their origin from Afghanistan and they consider themselves to be descendants of a common ancestor Jassi Khan, who was an Afghan chief and had earned the name of Sudhan (from Sanskrit, meanings "justice, fair and honest") as a compliment to his valour as he 500 years or so ago landed in Western parts of Poonch and fought for their existence, but the local people dominated them in this period, they multiplied quickly and emerged into a strong and powerful tribe.

[12] Sometime in the 1300s, Jassi Khan gathered an army of soldiers belonging to his clan, from in and around Ghazni, after he had been requested by the local Brahman tribes of present-day Sudhanoti to rescue them from a "tyrannous tribe", allegedly the "Bhagars" whom are said to have recently occupied those territories and ruled the local populace with cruelty.

[12][13] Jassi, after routing the Bhagars from Sudhanoti, was granted the laqab (title) "Sudhan" from Sanskrit by the Brahmans, which is said to translate to "Very fair".

Jassi later settled these territories with his troops and their families, accepting the title "Sudhan" and proceeding to rule the region of Sudhanoti until his death.

Subsequently, the Sikh Empire came to rule the region of the Kashmir Valley, though they had previously already obtained control over Jammu.

[21][22] Ranjit Singh's army was overwhelmingly superior in arms and number, with the deadly hill-cannons wreaking havoc upon the local territories.

After the prior successful conquest of Poonch, the local tribes of the region, including the Sudhans, had been pacified.

Ottam Singh arrived with a Dogra force of five thousand troops, but was defeated by rebels commandeered by Shams and his lieutenants.

Though Gulab had raised a sizeable and professional army, he chose not to engage the rebellion immediately to minimize the number of Dogra casualties.

This either neutralized them as foes, or turned a small number to his side completely, resulting in them aiding Gulab with either information or later fighting against the rebels.

Though the majority of the local population managed to escape Gulab's forces by taking refuge in nearby hills, their homes were looted, fields destroyed and cattle seized.

The cruelty shown by the Dogra forces was not forgotten, with British contemporaries being appalled at the treatment of the rebellious tribes and the people of Poonch as a whole by Gulab.

In 1846, after the Dogra Kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir was created and became a princely state of the British, Gulab Singh was forced to address the issue of his cruelty.

Spearheaded by Sardar Ibrahim Khan, they backed a movement supporting secession to Pakistan, which ultimately turned into an all-out revolt and later establishment of Azad Kashmir.

They had thus obtained expertise in war and some number of arms, which emboldened them to once again stand against the Dogra authorities, whom they had always been keen on expelling.

Leveraging these advantages, Sardar Ibrahim Khan and his cause found much support from his tribe alongside other local Muslims living in what is now Azad Kashmir.

After rebellion was officially declared, a rebel force (dubbed the 'Azad Army'), made up of local militiamen and veterans from mainly the Sudhans, alongside a smaller number of Dhunds of Bagh, was raised in Poonch.

The local Dogra garrisons were overwhelmed and defeated, with a provisional government declared with its capital in the Sudhan stronghold of Pallandri, which was later followed by a capture of the majority of the Poonch district.

Succeeding this, Pashtun lashkars arrived as reinforcements, all of which caused widespread collapse of Dogra authority in the Kingdom, which ultimately culminated in the creation of Azad Kashmir, Dogra Kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir's secession to India and the subsequent Indo-Pakistani war of 1947–1948.

It is the Sudhans who dominate the politics of Azad Kashmir in the present day, although the Gujjar community is estimated to be the largest among the population.