Excerpts from Books and Wikipedia
"The major exception was the great rising of 1857-8 on the north Indian plains, known to British historical tradition as the 'Indian Mutiny', a turning-point in the history of the British administration which has been retrospectively claimed as a forerunner of the Indian national movement. It was the last kick of traditional (north) India against the imposition of direct British rule, and finally brought down the old East Indian Company. . . . . Though the rising began as a mutiny of the Bengal army . . . , it turned into a major popular insurrection in the northern plains, under the leadership of traditional nobles and princes, and an attempt to restore the Mughal Empire. . . . Men rose against what they believed to be the increasingly rapid and ruthless destruction of their way of life by a foreign society. The 'Mutiny' was suppressed in a welter of blood, but it taught the British caution. . . . The large areas of India not yet taken under direct administration were left to the rule of puppet indigenous princes, controlled by the British yet officially flattered and respected, and these in turn became the pillars of the regime which guaranteed them wealth, local power and status." [Hobsbawm: Capital, p. 123-4]