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Rare British Indian b/w propaganda map with explanatory texts 67x43cm, printed on economy paper. Good, tanned, folded, some archival tape and earlier tape repairs to the verso, hole-punched for filing, with minor impact on content. "WNR" identifies this as part of a series of maps produced to accompany the World News Report issued by the Director of War Publicity, National War Front. Centred on Sicily and Malta, this covers from Berne and Budapest in the north, to the North Africa coast from Phillippeville to Derna in the south. Details include rail, roads, and pre-War frontiers. Six concentric circles emanate from Tunis at 100 mile intervals as far as Turin, Milan and Padua. Having cleared Axis and Vichy French forces out of West and North Africa, this marks the shift in Allied focus to Italy, demonstrating their reach from their base in Tunisia. The text explains "Southern Aircraft Carrier" is a defiant response to Ribbentrop's statement 8 months earlier that "There will come a time when we deal finally with this aircraft carrier in front of Europe - BRITAIN". Quoting Churchill, it states that Tunisia has become the second aircraft carrier, describing the bombing of several Italian locations from there, ending with "Both Aircraft Carriers are Unsinkable". An inset map superimposing NW Europe on the Central Mediterranean, shows the reach of both "aircraft carriers". This poster supported the British Indian Government's comprehensive propaganda operation to keep the population onside. With India providing over 2 million troops and several million others to the war effort at home, it tied the war to the fate of India, praised Indian contributions, and countered Axis propaganda. It began in 1940 with Provincial and District War Committees coordinated from Calcutta, and continued with the National War Front (NWF) from 1942, under the Director of War Publicity at Victory House in Madras. The NWF operated through Directors at Presidency level supported by District and Divisional organisers, and an array of lecturers, propagandists, village leaders, and inspectors reaching deep into the grassroots. In support, Victory House published the weekly "Madras War Review", and served as a Central Information Bureau with a Showroom displaying its models for railway cars, charts, maps, posters, and other material, which were replicated in local NWF "Victory Houses" across India. Very few of these materials survive. This one is not recorded on Worldcat or Library Hub. (References: Tamil Digital Library; P. Priya, "Popular Distress and the Second World War: Malabar, 1939-45, Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, Vol. 74 (2013), pp. 602-610).
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