Raj era theft scandal covered up in Britain: Report

Britain's then Prime Minister Clement Attlee, the chiefs of MI6 security service and Buckingham Palace aides all conspired to cover up one of the last scandals of the British Empire involving the theft of charity funds by one of its Governors posted in India, papers in the UK's National Archives have revealed.

Sir Arthur Hope, who served as the Governor of Madras Presidency between 1940 and 1946, had been entrusted with donations to the Indian Red Cross.

But in 1944, the British establishment became aware of his mounting gambling debts which led him to also misappropriate the funds intended for the charity, 'The Times' reported.

Hope reportedly had a passion for race-horses and tended to lose a lot of money on them, which led him to divert charitable funds to deal with mounting debt liabilities. The money he was thought to have siphoned off to settle his debts added up to 40,000 pound at the time.

According to the correspondence documents unearthed in the archives, when word reached ..