Indian soldiers fought some of the bloodiest battles in both World Wars and are honoured in war cemeteries in France.
On February 12, 2025, Prime Minister Narendra D Modi laid a wreath made of saffron, white and green flowers at the Mazargues War Cemetery in Marseilles to honour Indian soldiers killed in both World Wars.
The ashes of 205 Indian soldiers are commemorated in the cemetery, according to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.
53,486 Indian soldiers were killed in WWI and 24,338 in WWII.
Indian soldiers were deployed in Europe and the Middle East in WWI and in those theatres and in Africa and South East Asia in WWII.
Marseilles was the base for Indian troops in France during WWI.
Another French memorial to honour 4,700 Indian soldiers is in Neuve Chapelle where the Indian Corps fought its first major action as a single unit.
'Many sepoys fought with distinction, standing in the freezing sludge, with shrapnel tearing through bodies and being subjected to gas attacks,' historian Santanu Das has noted.
Khudadad Khan was the first Indian soldier to be awarded the Victoria Cross, Britain's highest military honour, at Messines, Belgium.
'Cannons, machine guns, rifles and bombs are going day and night, just like the rains in the month of saawan. Those who have escaped so far are like the few grains left uncooked in a pot.' -- Havildar Abdul Rahman, May 20, 1915.