Bengal Army The Bengal Army was the army of the Bengal Presidency , one of the three presidencies of the British Raj within the British Empire . The Presidency armies , like the presidencies themselves , belonged to the East India Company ( EIC ) until the Government of India Act 1858 ( passed in the aftermath of the Indian Rebellion of 1857 ) transferred all three presidencies to the direct authority of the British Crown . In 1895 all three presidency armies were merged into the Indian Army . Early History . The Bengal Army originated from its European Regiment which was formed in 1756 . The following year the first locally recruited unit of Bengal sepoys was created in the form of the " Lal Paltan " battalion . Drilled and armed along British army lines this force served well at the Battle of Plassey in 1757 and 20 more Indian battalions were raised by 1764 . The EIC steadily expanded its Bengal Army and by 1796 the establishment was set at three battalions of European artillery , three regiments of European infantry , ten regiments of Indian cavalry and twelve regiments ( each of two battalions ) of Indian infantry . In 1824 the Bengal Army underwent reorganisation , with the regular infantry being grouped into 68 single battalion regiments numbered according to their date of establishment . Nine additional infantry regiments were subsequently raised , though several existing units were disbanded between 1826 and 1843 . A new feature in the Bengal Army was the creation of irregular infantry and cavalry regiments during the 1840s . These were permanently established units but with less formal drill and fewer British officers than the regular Bengal line regiments . The main source of recruitment continued to be high caste Brahmins and Rajputs , although the eight regular cavalry regiments consisted mainly of Muslim sowars . During the 1840s and early 1850s numbers of Nepalese Gurkhas and Sikhs from the Punjab were however accepted in the Bengal Army . Both Gurkhas and Sikhs served in separate units but some of the latter were incorporated into existing Bengal infantry regiments . 1857 . A total of 64 Bengal Army regular infantry and cavalry regiments rebelled during the Indian Mutiny , or were disbanded after their continued loyalty was considered doubtful . Accordingly the Bengali presence in the Bengal Army was reduced from 1857 on because of their perceived primary role as mutineers in the 1857 rebellion . The new and less homogeneous Bengal Army was essentially drawn from Punjabi Muslims , Sikhs , Gurkhas , Baluchis and Pathans , although twelve of the pre - mutiny Bengal line infantry regiments continued in service with the same basis of recruitment as before . A largely unspoken rationale was that an army of diverse origins was unlikely to unite in rebellion . Post Mutiny . In 1895 the three separate Presidency Armies were abolished and the Army of India was divided into four commands , each commanded by a lieutenant - general . These comprised Madras ( including Burma ) , Punjab ( including the North West Frontier ) , Bengal and Bombay ( including Aden ) . Composition ( pre - mutiny ) . The Bengal Army included some of the most famous units in India : Skinner ' s Horse from Bengal , the Gurkhas from the Himalayas and the Corps of Guides on the Khyber - Pakhtunkhwa . Commanders . Because the Bengal Army was the largest of the three Presidency Armies , its Commander - in - Chief was , from 1853 to 1895 , also Commander - in - Chief , India . < br > Commander - in - Chief , Bengal Command