REBUILDING AND REHABILITATION OF RANGOON [Allocated Title]

With the British reoccupation of Rangoon, capital of Burma, troops work to rebuild and rehabilitate the city.

Slightly out of focus footage from a market place in Rangoon where a group of Indian soldiers are shown buying from local women; they sit of the ground with their wares. Closer shot; one of the women may be selling cheroots and they appear reluctant to take the soldiers' money. Indian soldiers walking through the market. Close-up; an Indian soldier (wearing 13th Frontier Force Rifles cap badge, either 2nd or 8th Battalion) with rifle on his shoulder sniffs a large cheroot or cigar. The soldiers examine a large cloth or carpet. Closer shot; soldiers talk to the female stall holder about some small items (handkerchiefs or similar?). Footage taken at Rangoon docks; a huge pile of tangled metal and concrete, presumably once a warehouse. A number of figures can be seen climbing amongst the wreckage (engineers?). Closer shot; men amongst the wreckage. Pan of a Chevrolet CMP light lorry driving along a quayside with the wreckage in the background. A bulldozer drives out of warehouse moving a mound of apparently rotten rice left behind by the Japanese. More shots of the bulldozer. Wide shot dockside; servicemen run along a quayside through torrential monsoon rain. Men with pick axes and sledgehammers in the pouring rain; there are small piles of personal equipment (Gurkha hats, mess tins) on the ground and dock cranes in the background. A bulldozer with a British driver pushes metal wreckage along the dockside. A bulldozer drags a large piece of steel set into concrete. Brief close shot of a tow cable going taut as it's used to pull wreckage clear. Men at work securing a cable. The cable is pulled but another large piece of steel and concrete refuses to come loose. More men come to try and free it. Wide shot; men on the dockside, a large pile of twisted metal and a ship berthed in the background. Shots of men at work clearing rubble into a lorry. Two men at work dismantling girders. Large group of people at work; men in the foreground may be civilians and they move a heavy oil drum. A Dodge lorry marked 'RE [Royal Engineers] works' drives off carrying a load of rubble and men sitting on top of it. Shots of a bulldozer manoeuvring. A merchant ship marked M.8 berthing. A mooring line is thrown ashore. The ship berths and is seen to be carrying troops and military vehicles. Somewhere on Prome Road in Rangoon an Indian signaller puts a ladder against a telegraph pole. Two linesmen working aloft up a telegraph pole. On the ground two soldiers coil telephone wire. An Indian soldier tests the cable with a field telephone. At the dockside a number of bicycles are unloaded by a crane. A large crate is unloaded. A cargo net of boxes and sacks is unloaded. A number of curved metal frames, apparently for the awnings of trucks, are unloaded. A lorry is unloaded (film ends just before the lorry is set down).

35mm