About

Often seen through a Eurocentric lens, the First World saw over 65 million troops from nearly 30 countries, with more than 9 million soldiers and countless civilian casualties. India's contributions, often overlooked, were crucial—over 1.3 million soldiers served, and 74,000 lost their lives. Among the first units to leave Indian shores were the Mysore Lancers, who, alongside troops from Hyderabad, Patiala, and Jodhpur, made significant contributions to British victories.
While archival materials have focused on soldiers from northern India, the contributions of southern Indian troops, particularly from Karnataka, remain underrepresented. In 2018, for the war's centenary, ReReeti launched White Pepper Black Pepper, a project aimed at filling this gap by exploring Bengaluru’s archival and personal narratives, uncovering the stories of southern soldiers and acknowledging India’s role in this historic event.
The project’s name is derived from the code words Indian soldiers used in their letters to describe their interactions with soldiers from different backgrounds.

Entrenched - The Travelling Exhibition

Testimonials

"This was amazing – much more than what I had expected. We started by watching a documentary on WWI and that got us attentive. It was really good. Then we entered the Entrenched structure. The textbooks don’t have much information so we learnt so much, especially about India's immense contribution. When you say history, we generally think of mugging up. This exhibition taught us that history has a science behind it – like a story. It's so interesting. We never thought we could learn about a war by actually walking through trenches."

Student

Ekya School

"A lot of emotions went through me while walking through Entrenched. I was sad reading the letters. I was angry that people do not commemorate this and I was amazed at this effort. An awesome and memorable experience. I’ll always remember the names of the people and their contributions."

Student

DPS, Bangalore North.