Presidency armies
From the mid-eighteenth century, the East India Company began to keep armies at each of its three main stations, or ‘Presidencies’, in India at Calcutta (Bengal), Madras and Bombay. The Bengal Army, Madras Army, and Bombay Army were quite different, each with its own list of Regiments and European officers. All three armies had both European regiments in which both the officers and men were Europeans, and a larger number of ‘Native’ regiments in which the officers were Europeans and the ordinary soldiers were Indians.