LONDON: The official announcement to be made at the forthcoming conference of Indian leaders at Delhi will contain no suggestion of premature British withdrawal from India, it can be confidently predicted, cables Fraser Wighton, Reuter’s Political Correspondent.

Reports hinting at the possibility of such premature withdrawal have been current during the present London talks between the Cabinet’s India experts and Lord Ismay, the Viceroy’s Chief of Staff, and have gained strength since the news of Lord Mountbatten’s flying visit to London to consult the Cabinet before the Delhi Conference. Political circles are certain that withdrawal without considered scheme for transfer of power to properly constituted authorities in India has never been contemplated by Britain.

At the same time, the British Plan for procedure to be announced when the Viceroy meets India’s chief political representatives … is clearly intended to provide a machinery for enabling Britain to carry out her pledge to transfer power not later than June of next year.

[Meanwhile, as reported from Lahore,] The Communal rioting in Lahore today [May 16] crossed the highest degree of bitterness and conflict ever witnessed in the capital of the Punjab with the latest conflagration in its history raging in a dozen localities within the old walled city.

Published in Dawn, May 17th, 2022