WAVELL PLAN & SIMLA CONFERENCE

Wavell Plan  & Simla Conference

1945

The war had ended, though Japan was yet to surrender. The heroic deeds of INA were about to end. More than 3 million people had lost lives in the Famine of Bengal, which was largely manmade as the Government stopped the supplies from Burma due to the fear of the Japanese invasion. Burma was the largest exporter of rice and the scarcity of the supplies coupled with the low rains and droughts in several parts of India from as early as 1942, when 10 princely states of Rajputana had declared themselves famine affected as per the famine code and wanted to get relief. People in Orissa and Bengal died and the government could take steps to save a few only. The Muslim league had escalated the demand for a separate sovereign state. There was a deadlock with the congress since 1939 resignations.

Wavell’s objective, as stated in a letter to Churchill, was to form "a provisional government, of the type suggested in the Cripps Declaration, within the present Constitution, coupled with an earnest but not necessarily simultaneous attempt to devise a means to reach a constitutional settlement." 

Wavell had a one-and-a-quarter hour meeting with Churchill on 29 March 1945. The Prime Minister thought that the problem of India, 'could be kept on ice", but Wavell told him quite firmly that the question of India was very urgent and very important. It was on 31 May that Wavell at last got a go-ahead from the Cabinet largely on the lines he had desired. He left London on June 1, and landed at Karachi on June 4.

The British Government's new proposals were publicly disclosed on 14 June 1945, on which date the Viceroy made a broadcast at New Delhi and the Secretary of State made a statement in the House of Commons. In this broadcast, Wavell said the proposals he was making were not an attempt to impose a constitutional settlement, but the hope that the Indian parties would agree on a settlement of the communal issue which had not been fulfilled, and in the meantime great problems had to be solved. He therefore invited the great leaders to a conference in Simla on 25 June to consult with him the formation of the new Executive Council. The Viceroy concluded the broadcast with the announcement that orders had been given for the immediate release of the members of the Congress Working Committee who were in detention. The summarized form of Wavell’s proposals are as under:

·                     The government will reconstitute the Viceroy’s Executive Council consisting of wholly the Indians except that of Viceroy and the Commander-in-Chief.

·                     Dominion status would be granted to India.

·                     The representation of the Muslims and Hindus would be equal in the Viceroy’s Council.

·                     Indians would frame out their constitution.

·                     The Governor-General will hold on to the veto power in the very interest of the people of India.

The meeting was attended by the Muslim League and the Congress both but the disparities arose on the question of Muslim representation. The Muslim League emphasized that it was the only representative part of the Muslims of India and it would its representatives itself. On the contrary, the Congress claimed to be the translator of all the communities of India including Muslims and stance was strengthened by Maulana Azad who was sent by the Congress to pose the Muslim representation. Resultantly, the Wavell plan could not be accepted and Lord Wavell admitted the failure of the plan.

In a meeting with the Viceroy on June 27, Jinnah had said that he wanted a council of fourteen, including the Viceroy and commander-in-chief with five Hindus, five Muslims, one Sikh and one Scheduled Caste. He said that this was the only council in which the Muslims would stand a chance of not being out-voted on every issue. It was after seeing that the Viceroy accepted that the conference had failed because he had been unable to accede to Jinnah's demands; Jinnah explained:

"…if we accept this arrangement, the Pakistan issue will be shelved and out into cold storage indefinitely, whereas the Congress will have secured under this arrangement what they want, namely, a clear road for their advance towards securing Hindu national independence of India, because the future Executive will work as unitary Government of India, and we know that this interim or provisional arrangement will have a way of settling down for an unlimited period, and all the forces in the proposed Executive, plus the known policy of the British Government and Lord Wavell's strong inclination for a united India, would completely jeopardize us."