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Indian provincial elections: 1946

Labour Prime Minister Clement Attlee had been deeply interested in Indian independence since the 1920s, being surrounded by Labour statesmen who were affiliated with Krishna Menon and the India League, and for years had supported it. He now took charge of the government position and gave the issue the highest priority. A Cabinet Mission was sent to India led by the Secretary of State for India, Lord Pethick Lawrence, which also included Sir Stafford Cripps, who had visited India four years before. The objective of the mission was to arrange for an orderly transfer to independence. In February 1946, mutinies broke out in the armed services, starting with RAF servicemen frustrated with their slow repatriation to Britain. These mutinies failed to turn into revolutions as the mutineers surrendered after the Congress and the Muslim League convinced the mutineers that they won't get victimised.

In early 1946, new elections were held in India. This coincided with the infamous trial of three senior officers − Shah Nawaz Khan, Prem Sahgal, and Gurubaksh Singh Dhillon − of Subhas Chandra Bose 's defeated Indian National Army (INA) who stood accused of treason. Now as the trials began, the Congress leadership, although having never supported the INA, chose to defend the accused officers and successfully rescued the INA members.

British rule had lost its legitimacy for most Hindus, and conclusive proof of this came in the form of the 1946 elections with the Congress winning 91 percent of the vote among non-Muslim constituencies, thereby gaining a majority in the Central Legislature and forming governments in eight provinces, and becoming the legitimate successor to the British government for most Hindus. If the British intended to stay in India the acquiescence of politically active Indians to British rule would have been in doubt after these election results, although many rural Indians may still have acquiesced to British rule at this time. The Muslim League won the majority of the Muslim vote as well as most reserved Muslim seats in the provincial assemblies, and it also secured all the Muslim seats in the Central Assembly.