NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday paid tributes to Mangal Pandey on his birth anniversary, lauding his courage in challenging the British Empire.

The story of his valour will always be a source of inspiration to the people of the country, he said on X.

A soldier in the Bengal army of the East India Company, Pandey became the face of Indian soldiers' rebellion against British rule in 1857 over a host of simmering grievances in what came to be described by many historians as India's "first war of independence."