During the time of Englands occupation of India a company called the East India Company employed Sepoys, native light infantry who were mainly hindu.these soldiers swore allegience to the EIC and were not part of the regular British Army that swore allegience to the Queen of England.
Early muzzle loading muskets called brown bess were the weapon used by the sepoys.
It required that in order to load the weapon the cartridge was a leather casing that was coated with animal fat around a bit of gunpowder and the musket ball. The animal fat made loading easier.
The way to load the rifle was to Bite the cartridge , hold the casing and the ball in your mouth,place powder down the barrel and then spit the ball which was wrapped in the casing into the barrel and then ram it down with the ram rod.
Put the rest of the powder in the frizzen , pull back the hammer aim and fire. A well trained Sepoy could fire 3 rounds a minute , 4 if he banged the butt of the musket on the ground rather than ram the powder down
At some point the sepoys , who believed the fat that was around the casing was a mixture was a mix of pig and lamb fat found out it was actually beef fat , an animal they held sacred and would not eat.
By biting the cartridges they were inadvertantly eating it.
They asked the EIC to revert back to the original casing fat , they refused and the sepoys revolted.
Many EIC employees were killed including women and children , the British government then deployed the Quieens troop to put the uprising down.
The ringleaders of the revolt were hung and many sepoys were killed in the battles against the regular troops.
Whilst it was a defeat for the sepoys they actually won a morale victory and a win for their self esteme. It also showed England that the indians were not cattle or lesser being sthat could be so easily expolited and it changed the face of anglo - indian relations for many years.
This rebellion brought about the end of both the East India Company's rule in India, and the Mughal Empire replacing it with direct rule by the British government (British Raj) of much of the Indian subcontinent for the next 90 years, although a few hundred states retained nominal independence under their respective Nawabs and Rajas, or kings
