After the death of young soldier, Mangal Pandey, some sepoys of the regiment at Meerut refused to do the army drill using the new cartridges.

The sepoys had raised the following objections when they were asked to use new cartridges:

(i) The cartridges used for new rifles were greased with the fat of cows and pigs. It is a great insult to the regions of Indian sepoys—the Hindus as well as the Muslims.

(ii) It appeared to the Indian soldiers that the great aim of the English was to turn all the sepoys into Christians, and they had therefore introduced the cartridge in order to bring this about, since both Mohammedans and Hindus would be defined by using it.

(iii) Their religious sentiments were affected and this was the main reason that they refused to use the new cartridges.