4. Ammunition

The old soldier continued: `Last year new muskets came from Europe. They require bullets the size of Jambul seed. Bullets too came from Europe. Soldiers were excited to see them, for these guns have a higher range. The muskets were distributed across the cantonments in Hindustan.'

`The cartridges of the new ammunition have to be bitten off. Government started a cartridge factory at Damdam, near Calcutta. It so happened that one day a Brahmin was filling up his water-pitcher at a pond. A man of cobbler caste came there, and asked for water. The Brahmin told him: If I do that, it would pollute me.'

`The cobbler said: Don't you be so proud. The new cartridges are lined with beef and pork fat. You have to bite them off. You think that doesn't pollute?'

'It led to a fight. People gathered. Some Company soldiers were among them. In a short while the news spread that new cartridges were impure, anti-religion. Hindus thought: We worship cow. Her fat would be in our teeth -- no sin can be greater than that. Mussalmans had a contrary grievance. They consider pig to be impure and haram, so much so that they don't even say the word. So they too were incensed to realize that they would be biting off pig-fat.'

`There was a great hullabaloo in every cantonment. Soldiers felt that Government was out to convert them, by trick, or by force. So the Lord Sahib, who sits in Calcutta, wrote to England. The affair came to be mentioned in the Parliament. One of them, a mighty Lord, said: I have a lot of experience of soldiering. I will proceed to India, and make them accept the new cartridges.'

`Here, the black soldiers were full of suspicion. The news was spreading at unimaginable speed. Soldiers couldn't think of anything else: day and night they pondered how to avoid this calamity -- the impending loss of one's religion.