The Sepoy Rebellion

By the early 1800s, British officials introduced Western education and legal procedures. dropdown which they felt was superior to Indian religions. dropdown They worked to end slavery and the caste system and to improve the position of women within the family. One law banned sati (SUH tee), a Hindu dropdown It called for a widow to join her husband in death by throwing herself on his funeral fire. In the 1850s, the East India Company made several unpopular moves. First, it required sepoys (SEE poyz), or dropdown For high-caste Hindus, however, overseas travel was an offense against their religion. Second, the East India Company passed a law that dropdown Hindus viewed both moves as a dropdown Then, in 1857, the British issued new rifles to the sepoys. Troops were told dropdown The cartridges, however, were greased with animal fat—either from cows, dropdown or from pigs, which were forbidden to Muslims. When the troops refused the order to “load rifles,” dropdown Angry sepoys rose up against their British officers. The Sepoy Rebellion swept across northern and central India. dropdown There, they hailed the last Mughal ruler as their leader. In some places, dropdown But the British soon rallied and crushed the revolt. dropdown torching villages and slaughtering thousands of unarmed Indians.