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Colonial Era and the Indian Sepoy Module - III

Military History of the
The Gurkhas were also promised to be taken to England and serve the Queen later.
Colonial Era
That is why you have Gurkha regiments in today's British army. The British used the
word 'Native' to describe Indians and hence we have the word Native Indian Army.
The British used this term during the period of recruitment.

9.3.2 Rank Structure in the British Army in India

We saw how the recruitment took place for sepoys of the Indian army. Let us now
move on to the rank structures. The rank structures are very much essential to have Note
command and control in the units.

Ranks are prestigious to the army. Before we see the ranks in the army let us understand
why we need these ranks. Just as in a factory we have the supervisor and manager, we
have ranks in the army. The reasons for having ranks are:-

 Command and control during war & peace.
 Better administration of Army
 Some ranks were created to act as a link between the British officers and the
sepoys.

In the British Indian army, the term Sepoy was a designation given to the Indian soldier.
They were from the local communities of the Bombay and Madras presidencies. As
mentioned earlier, the sepoy in the Bengal army was from high class Brahmin family.
The basic chain of command started with the European captain at the top, followed by
subaltern, sergeant majors (also European), under whom were subedars, jamadars,
and havildar-naiks (recruiting agents).

The sepoys (native soldiers) in each battalion were divided into ten companies that
comprised one subedar, three jamadars, four naiks, two drummers, one trumpeter,
and seventy sepoys. Earlier the subedar had commanded an independent company,
now his company became one among nine or ten that made up a battalion.

What You Have Learnt

 The colonial powers originated from Europe
 They came to India for trade and commerce

 There was lack of unity among Indian rulers then
 The colonial powers had hatred among themselves and fought with each other

 They organized armies for the security for the three Presidencies in Bombay,
Madras and Calcutta and later they started recruiting soldiers regularly from
Native Indians
 The high level officers belonged to British while the lower level soldiers were
from the natives

 Rank structures were introduced slowly to these armies

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