An uprising against British rule in India. It began as a mutiny of Indian sepoys in the army of the English East India Company, commencing at Meerut on 10 May 1857, and spreading rapidly to Delhi and including most regiments of the Bengal army as well as a large section of the civil population in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. The immediate cause was the soldiers’ refusal to handle new cartridges apparently greased with pig and cow fat (an outrage to Muslims and Hindus respectively). The mutineers seized Delhi. The rebels restored the former Mogul Emperor Bahadur Shah II to his throne, whereupon the movement spread to Lucknow, which was besieged, and to Cawnpore (now Kanpur), where the massacre of the British garrison is believed to have been instigated by Tantia Topi, a Maratha Brahman who became the military leader of the rebels. The recapture of Delhi by forces from the Punjab on 14 September 1857 broke the back of the mutiny. Following the restoration of British control, the East India Company’s rule was replaced by that of the British Crown.