Victor Bulwer-Lytton, 2nd Earl of Lytton

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Victor Alexander George Robert Bulwer-Lytton, 2nd Earl of Lytton KG, GCSI, GCIE, PC, DL (18761947) was a British politician.

Lytton was born in Simla in India, during the time when his father was Viceroy of that colony. He married Pamela Chichele-Plowden, an early flame of Sir Winston Churchill, who had met her while playing polo at Secunderabad. However, the relationship was amicably broken off in 1902 when she decided to marry Lytton instead. In 1905 he was President of the Edinburgh Sir Walter Scott Club and gave the Toast to Sir Walter at the clubs annual dinner.

Apart from this, Lytton, who had studied at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge, started off his official career by filling up various posts in the Admiralty between 1916 and 1920, before being appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for India, a post which he held between 1920 and 1922. He was also made a Privy Counsellor in 1919. After this, he was posted as Governor of Bengal, remaining there until 1927. For a short while, when there was a vacancy caused by change in incumbents in 1925, he also functioned as Viceroy, his father's old post. After this he filled miscellaneous positions in various capacities, when matters concerning India came up. He wrote 2 books, the first being a life of Edward Buller, first Lord Lytton, while the other book dealt with his experiences in India and was called Pundits and Elephants, published in 1942. He was made a Knight of the Garter in 1933.

Lytton may be best known for his chairmanship of the Lytton Commission, which was sent by the League of Nations on a fact-finding mission to determine who was to blame in the 1931 war between Japan and China. The commission's Lytton Report, issued in 1933, caused Japan to withdraw from the League of Nations.

Political offices
Preceded by
Lord Sinha
Under-Secretary of State for India
1920–1922
Succeeded by
Earl Winterton
Preceded by
Earl of Ronaldshay
Governor of Bengal
1922–1927
Succeeded by
Sir Stanley Jackson
Preceded by
The Earl of Reading
Viceroy of India
1925
Succeeded by
The Lord Irwin
Peerage of the United Kingdom
Preceded by
Robert Bulwer-Lytton
Earl of Lytton
1891–1947
Succeeded by
Neville Bulwer-Lytton