The film begins by depicting Indians drawing blinds and extinguishing lights for the wartime blackout. Here we can see the advances of this film upon earlier FAB productions. The filmmakers make dramatic use of darkness and light to underline their message, and they are also careful to couch the blackout in appropriate terms: India’s cities are described as going into ‘purdah’ at night. As well as being instructional, the blackout theme is employed as a means of illustrating the imminent possibility of an enemy attack, something that is then elaborated upon. By means of maps and footage of British and Indian military personnel, India’s strategic position is outlined, as is the need for the country’s vigilance. Here a parallel is drawn with the situation in Europe: ‘Sirens: England laughed at them until 1940’.

Having outlined the danger, the filmmakers are well placed to discuss the need and value of Indian support. The film now turns to its main theme: India’s industrial contribution to the War. It is here, however, that it begins to be pulled in different directions. In part, the film is clearly aimed at Indians; here it offers an alternative to John Milton’s ‘They also serve who only stand and wait’, instead maintaining that ‘with thread and bodkin these men and women also fight’. This boosting of the activities of the Indians who are producing War goods is accompanied by a stress that what they are producing is destined for India’s own troops: a roll call of goods is described and depicted; the viewer is then informed that they are being ‘loaded for Indian troops overseas’. Nevertheless, it should not be forgotten that this film was retitled Arms From India, and this section also appears to have been constructed with a British audience in mind, as such it outlines the fact that out of the ‘40,000 items on the Ordnance shopping list, more than half are made in India’.

Similarly, the following section on the wartime support of Indians appears to be aimed at both Indian and British audiences. One of its purposes is to encourage Indians to recruit. Its most notable sequence features footage of a lone soldier, who is filmed from the neck down only. While he is being filmed the voiceover talks of recruits being drawn from all of India’s religions, and the decision not to disclose the soldier’s face the film encourages Indian viewers from all backgrounds to think that they could be the person to fulfil this role. Surrounding this sequence, there is an emphasis on the loyal support of Indians: mention is made of the donations made by Indian Princes, and we hear of the ‘hundreds of thousands’ who have volunteered for the Army. While aiming to encourage further support from Indians, these scenes also appear to be addressed to a British audience, reassuring them of the loyalty of the sub-continent.

The film closes as it began: stressing the imminent danger of an Axis attack. It also introduces a new theme here and becomes more openly contradictory. It is argued that, although India ‘excels in the arts of peace’, the country needs to go to war so that it can thwart the ‘barbaric ideals of the enemy’. We are told that the Axis powers would wish to disrupt India’s ‘ancient, tranquil civilisation’, which is depicted via the film’s first images of rural India. The film now talks of a ‘baffling material age’ that the Axis powers would wish to usher in. However, it is hard to forget that we had previously been shown modern methods of manufacture developed in India, ‘eighth industrial country of the world’, and that these had been developed for Allied rather than Axis ends; the film had also boasted about these wartime developments being ‘a symbol of India’s industrial progress’. In an attempt to reach out to those who would wish to preserve the traditions of India as well as to those who would wish to see the country progress, the film is not successful in reconciling its aims. Moreover, it should be considered just whom the film is trying to address here. It is possible that it is aiming to win over different parties in India, but it is also possible that it is addressing an American audience, aiming to illustrate the diverse ways in which Britain protected the interests of its colony.

Richard Osborne (July 2010)