Gurkha infantry of 1st Battalion 10th Gurkha Rifles, 63rd Brigade, 17th Indian Division, seen entering the town of Pegu (Bago) during IV Corps' advance on Rangoon, capital of Burma.

Gurkha troops walking through a wrecked building. An Indian elephant with calf are admired by civilians and servicemen. A number of Gurkhas seen mucking about with an abandoned bicycle. Two Gurkhas pass a corpse; the first is armed with a Thompson submachine gun and has a kukri on his belt. Troops under a covered walkway. Gurkhas outside a pagoda. Indian Engineers repairing a road with burning buildings in the background. British troops walk along the verges of a road in double file; a jeep passes between them.

Notes

Dopesheet is dated 2 April, but this must be a typing error as Pegu was not captured until 2 May 1945.

Cameraman remarks on his dopesheet that he had anticipated shooting enough material for a story, but did not find enough action to do so.

Pegu (now Bago) was the last major town on the road to Rangoon, and if its river could be bridged there would be nothing to stop IV Corps' advance on the city. The commander of 17th Indian Division, Major-General 'Punch' Cowan, who had led the division throughout almost the entire Burma campaign since 1942, had been desperate to reach Rangoon and five of his battalions had been forced to retreat all the way to India three years previously. Ultimately he was denied by a monsoon season that broke two weeks earlier than expected and Rangoon was taken after an unopposed amphibious landing by 26th Indian Division.