A purported letter from Lord Mountbatten to Jawaharlal Nehru claiming that India was given independence for 99 years is fabricated and contradicts the legal record of Indian Independence.
An image of an alleged historical letter from Lord Louis Mountbatten to India’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, is circulating on social media. The document appears to be written on Buckingham Palace letterhead and is dated August 14, 1947, just one day before India became independent.
According to the text of the purported letter, Mountbatten allegedly informed Nehru that Britain’s decision to grant independence to India was made “on a lease of ninety-nine years.” The claim therefore suggests that India’s freedom was temporary and that the country was expected to return to British rule after the lease expired.
However, the alleged Mountbatten letter circulating online does not stand up to scrutiny.
Fact Check
We examined the document for technical inconsistencies. One of the first red flags is found within the text itself. The word “stability” is misspelled as “staellity” in the final paragraph. Such an error is inconsistent with the presentation expected from a formal official communication attributed to a senior British statesman.
What does the Indian Independence Act say?
The most important evidence comes from the actual legal document that governed Britain’s transfer of power.
The Indian Independence Act, 1947, was passed by the British Parliament and received...
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