Indian News Parade 120 opens with a lengthy address to camera delivered by Lord Wavell, the Viceroy of India, as he broadcasts his proposals to ‘solve the Indian Political deadlock’ and ‘advance India towards her goal of full self-government’. The speech, outlining what is widely known as the ‘Wavell Plan’, was delivered on 14 June 1945, and on the same day, Leo Amery, the Secretary of State for India, delivered a similar speech to the House of Commons (The Times, 15 June 1945, 5).

Lord Wavell had sought to organise the summit and push forward his proposals over the previous year, but his attempts had been blocked, not least by Churchill’s Cabinet. Wavell had written to Churchill in October 1944. ‘I feel very strongly’ he began, ‘that the future of India is the problem on which the British Commonwealth and the British reputation will stand or fall in the post-war period’. He warned that post-war India could descend into ‘chaos’ and argued that the government was treating vital problems in India with ‘neglect… hostility and contempt’. Wavell then set out a proposal for India, which included the formation of a provisional government incorporating the most prominent Indian political leaders. However, the proposals and letter were largely ignored by Churchill, who planned to reply ‘at leisure and best of all in victorious peace’. The proposals were then rejected after a meeting of the War Cabinet on 18 December (Wolpert, 2006, 75-77).

Wavell was increasingly frustrated at the government’s failure to address the Indian situation, and arrived in England on 23 March 1945. Amery noted that this provided, as he saw it, ‘the first talks on the Indian problem at large in five years!’ and eventually on 31 May, after further delays, and after victory over Germany had been secured, Churchill agreed to Wavell’s proposals for the Simla summit (Clarke, 2008, 279). Peter Clarke attributed Churchill’s concession to the impending general election, as Wavell and Amery both threatened to resign over the issue, and Churchill could not afford such a scenario barely a month before the election (Clarke, 2008, 319). Piers Brendon further argued that Churchill had only agreed to the conference ‘because he was confident that it would come to nothing’ (Brendon, 2007, 401).

On his return to Delhi on 5 June, Wavell met with the existing council and noted in his diary that his proposals ‘met with a very cold reception… hardly any member had a good word to say for them’. Plans were immediately leaked to the press from within the council, and while his decision to release the members of the Congress Working Committee, imprisoned since the Quit India protests of 1942, ‘drew favourable press comment’, a number of press reports and editorials immediately questioned the proposals (Clarke, 2008, 329). For example, an editorial in The Tribune on 16 June argued that ‘it will be deceiving oneself to imagine that the Wavell Plan will either appease the hunger of the people of India for freedom or it will bring India much nearer the realisation of her objective for which lakhs of her sons have undergone great suffering and made untold sacrifices’ (Khan and Pubby, 1996, 101). The problem, the paper argued, was in the proposed introduction of ‘communal representation’ in the executive council. Dawn, the official organ of the Muslim League, also warned on 15 June, that ‘the Musalmans will tolerate no infiltration of non-league stooges to humour any party’ (Menon, 1998, 188).

The film contains an edited version of Wavell’s speech. For example, there is no mention on film of Wavell’s plans to release the imprisoned members of the Working Committee of Congress. The next three issues of the newsreel all feature the progress of the conference, and this subject featured again in issue 125 (‘Indian Leaders leave Simla’).