Eternal India Encyclopedia

Eternal India encyclopedia

FREEDOM MOVEMENT

and the resources to carry on a prolonged struggle. The British on the other hand were very well organised and equipped. * The scope and suddenness of the revolt had given the Brit- ish a terrible shock. Their repri- sal was therefore vicious in the extreme. Recaptured with the help of troops from the Punjab, Delhi was subjected to a reign of terror, a general massacre of the population combined with prolonged looting reduced the city to a bloody shambles. * Captured sepoys were blown out of field guns or simply bayo

as an attack on the Hindu religion, for they would have to cross the seas, in | violation of their relig- ious code, to fight in Burma. | Immediate cause : Then came the bigger provocation, the use of greased cartridges made of pig and cow's fat, a taboo for Muslims and Hin- dus, which had to be inserted into the rifles only after their ends had been bitten off. This triggered off the revolt. The introduction of greased cartridges showed the British rulers' complete disregard of

iv)

v)

neted to death.

were Delhi, Kanpur, Lucknow, Bareilly, Bundelkhand and Oudh. Local revolts took place in many other parts of the country. Leaders of the Revolt were Mangal Pan- dey, Begum Hazrat Mahal, Tantia Tope, Nana Saheb, Rani Lakshmi Bai of Jhansi, Bakht Khan, Azimullah Khan, Kunwar Singh, Maulvi Ahmadullah, Bahadur Khan and Rao Tula Ram. The British suffered heavy casualties at Kanpur. Lucknow, too, fell rather easily to a force led by Hazrat Mahal. More and more mutineers joined the fray, helping Tantia Tope and the Rani of Jhansi to acquire control of Bundelkhand, Khan Bahadur Khan to seize Rohilkhand and Kunwar Singh to establish himself in west Bihar. Suppression of the Uprising * The Indian triumph was however short- lived, as they lacked both central leadership

in 1857 at Barrackpore and Berhampur in Bengal. In January 1857, the sepoys of Dum Dum refused to accept the new cartridges and in March a regiment in Barrackpore which followed their example was disbanded. Mangal Pandey was executed in Bar- rackpore for rebelling against their introduc- tion. On 9th May, some troops of Meerut cantonment were stripped of their uniforms and put behind bars for disobedience of or- ders. On the next day, all the three regiments based at Meerut rose up in arms, released the prisoners and put their British officers to the sword. Then they headed for Delhi, seized the city with the help of the local Indian garrison and proclaimed Bahadur Shah as the Em- peror of India. In this way the rebellion spread to the whole of Northern India. The major centres

Bahadur Shah II (b 1775-1862) :

He was the last

Mughal

Emperor

of From 1837-57, he was allowed to retain the imperial title by the English East India Company. During the Sepoy Mutiny in 1857 mutineers pro- claimed him Em- Delhi.

peror of Hindustan at Delhi. He wasa gifted Urdu poet (pen name Zafar) and writer of commentary on Sheikh Saadi's Guhstan. He was also a Persian scholar and talented Calligrapher. He was exiled to Rangoon in Burma. He died in 1862.