When the First World War broke out in 1914, the British turned to a region they had long relied upon for soldiers: Punjab. Over the next four years, and again during the Second World War, men from Punjab's farms and small towns travelled to battlefields they could scarcely have imagined, fighting in Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia. Among them, Sikh soldiers became some of the most recognised figures in the British Indian Army, distinctive in their turbans and respected for their steadiness under fire. Their service was vast in scale, costly in life, and lasting in its effect on both their homeland and the wider world.
A Province That Carried the Army
Punjab supplied a remarkable share of the men who filled the ranks of the British Indian Army. By the close of the First World War, the province had provided roughly 360,000 combat recruits, close to half of all those raised across the subcontinent. These included large numbers of Punjabi Muslims, Sikhs and Hindus, drawn especially from rural districts where military service was a respected path. Sikhs, though a small fraction of India's overall population, enlisted in numbers far out of proportion to their size, with tens of thousands serving in the field. The British had come to regard Punjab as their primary recruiting ground, and in some villages volunteer rates climbed strikingly high. For an introduction to the homeland these men came from, see Punjab.
Onto the Western Front
Indian troops were among the first imperial reinforcements to reach Europe. The Jullundur Brigade, which included the 15th Ludhiana Sikhs, the 47th Sikhs and the 34th Sikh Pioneers, left India in August 1914 and was holding trenches near Neuve-Chapelle in France by mid-October. They arrived as winter set in, unprepared for the cold and the unfamiliar conditions of trench warfare, yet they held their ground through some of the war's earliest and hardest fighting. Their presence in 1914 and 1915 helped steady the British line at a moment when trained troops were desperately scarce.
Across Many Fronts
The war carried Punjabi soldiers far beyond France. They fought at Gallipoli against Ottoman forces, endured the long and grinding campaign in Mesopotamia, served in East Africa, and held positions across the Middle East. A generation later, during the Second World War, the scale grew even larger. The Indian Army of that period became the largest volunteer force in history to that point, with some 2.5 million serving. Indian divisions fought in North Africa against Rommel's Afrika Korps, took part in the costly Italian campaign including the battle for Monte Cassino, and turned back the Japanese advance in Burma. Sikh and Punjabi units were present in nearly every one of these theatres.
A Reputation Earned in Blood
The gallantry of these soldiers was recognised at the highest level. Across both wars, Indian troops received thousands of awards for bravery, including numerous Victoria Crosses, the highest decoration in the British and Commonwealth forces. In the Second World War alone, members of the Indian Army earned 31 Victoria Crosses. Such honours came at a heavy price: more than 87,000 Indian soldiers died in the Second World War, following the great losses of the First. Behind each decoration lay countless acts of endurance that were never formally recorded.
An inscription at the Neuve-Chapelle Indian Memorial appears in four languages, English, Arabic, Hindi and Gurmukhi, honouring the Muslim, Hindu and Sikh faiths of the men who fell.
The Turban Instead of the Helmet
One detail set Sikh soldiers apart wherever they served. Rather than exchange their turbans for steel helmets, Sikhs wore the turban into battle, a practice rooted in their faith and identity. This made them instantly recognisable in photographs from the trenches and the desert alike, and it became a quiet symbol of how religious commitment could be carried even into modern industrial warfare. To understand its deeper meaning, see The Turban.
Remembered in Stone, and in Change
The dead were not forgotten. The Neuve-Chapelle Indian Memorial in northern France, designed by Sir Herbert Baker, commemorates some 4,742 Indian soldiers with no known grave. Its tall pillar, topped by a lotus and the Star of India, stands on ground where Indian troops fought in 1915. Wartime service also reshaped Punjab itself. Men who had seen the wider world returned with new horizons, and that experience fed the steady growth of the Punjabi diaspora. It also stirred expectations at home: many returning soldiers, having risked everything for the Empire, joined the growing call for a greater say in their own affairs, a current that ran through the events of the post-war years. The crowds gathered at Jallianwala Bagh in 1919 included such veterans, a reminder that the journey from the battlefield often led back to questions of justice and self-rule.