Viceroy's Executive Council

The advisory council of the Governor-General was based in the capital Calcutta and consisted of four members, three of which were appointed by the Secretary of State for India and one by the Sovereign.

The five ordinary members took charge of a separate department: home, revenue, military, law and finance.

These proposals were rejected by the Indian National Congress, All-India Muslim League and Hindu Mahasabha.

However they were revived the next year by Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru of the Liberal Party, and accepted by Viceroy who on the 22nd of July 1941 announced a reconstituted Executive Council where for the first time Indians outnumbered Britons.

Sir Malik Feroz Khan Noon (ICS officer and High Commissioner in London) appointed Defence member, the first Indian to hold the post (key Congress demand).

Sir Ramaswamy Mudaliar, a Tamil politician and Maharaja Jam Saheb Sri Digvijaysinhji Ranjitsinhji of Jamnagar were appointed to newly elevated positions as representatives of the Government of India to the Imperial War Cabinet in London and to Pacific War Council in Washington DC.

The Interim Government began to function from 2 September 1946 once the Indian National Congress members took their seats.