National Security
The Netaji Mystery
Dt: 6/5/15
The Netaji Mystery
Dr T.H.Chowdary*
In the context of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit, Netaji Subhash’s relatives in Germany and India reiterated their request for declassifying ( as secret) the files about Netaji Bose, in the possession of the Government of India . It has been now revealed that the Intelligence Bureau of the Government of India has been snooping on Bose’s relatives in Kolkatta well into the 1960s (Nehru’s life-time) Three Commissions of the GOI including one when Atal Behari Bajpai was Prime Minister gave reports which have not helped to put the doubt about Netaji’s death in an air crash in Formosa (now Taiwan; then under Japanese occupation) at rest.
2. The Congress and UPA governments refused to declassify Bose Files holding that it would adversely affect India’s foreign relations! , without revealing the names of those countries. When in opposition, the BJP assured the countrymen that it would declassify the Bose files and open them for public scrutiny. But now after coming to power in 2014, with absolute majority in the Lok Sabha, it is not yet willing to declassify the Bose files! The reasons are as mysterious as Netaji’s death.
3. There are reasons to believe that Nehru’s antagonism to Subhas Bose in the latters life-time, his jealousy about Bose’s popularity and the possible Bose’s ascendancy if he returned alive could be the reasons why Nehru and his dynastic rulers would not let the truth come out. Consider the following:
4. Nehru who lectured the public about his socialism refused to join the Working Committee of the Congress, constituted by Subhash Bose who won a second term in 1939, defeating Gandhiji’s candidate, Dr. Pattabhi Sitaramaiah. Bose questioned Nehru’s sincerity in espousing socialism. His letter to Nehru was carping and exposed Nehru’s “selfishness” to follow Gandhiji and not stand up for socialism. Bose’s letter to Nehru is appended.
5. When in the first half of 1945, the second world war was still raging against Japan, Nehru and other Congress leaders were released. On his visit to Kolkata, Nehru bragged that he would “fight Subhas Chandra Bose with a sword in hand” if he returned to India ( as an ally of Japan)! That revealed his visceral enmity to Subhash Bose. He was therefore inclined (joyously) to believe Bose’s death in a plane crash later and would want the people to believe the story. But the story of Bose’s death as put out by Japan was not believed then or now, by large sections of people. His survival after Japan’s defeat and return to Indi a would have made him the darling of the people and he could be a successful challenger to Nehru for Prime Ministership of free India. The saga of the INA founded by Bose would have assured Bose’s ascendancy.
6. Nehru, who declared pompously that he would fight Bose with a sword ,did not hesitate to claim the legacy of Bose’s INA which endeared to the whole of India. When the INA officers were put on trial for sedition against the (British) government of India , Nehru domed his lawyer’s dress to defend them! Bose was dead ( in Nehru’s desire and shaky belief), but his glory must be shared by Nehru; so he would defend the INA officers! He who deserted Bose to be on the right side of Mahatma Gandhi, his protector and patron, wanted to be seen as a comrade in arms of Subhash Chandra Bose and his INA men.
7. This Nehru-Bose rift reminds us of Stalin-Trotsky rivalry and how it ended. Lenin liked Trotsky to succeed him. But Stalin managed to become the Secretary of the CPSU (B) and ruler of Soviet Russia. Trotsky had to flee. He went to Mexico and got asylum there. Trotsky alive anywhere was a risk Stalin would not suffer. Trotsky was assassinated in Mexico. Who did the murder is still a mystery like Kennedy’s. The Stalin-Trotsky affair is a good parallel to Nehru-Bose affair.
8. The surprise is why the BJP is refusing to declassify the files, even 70 years after Bose’s “death”; would it declassify at an appropriate occasion like elections to the West Bengal legislature in 2016? (654 words)
END
Appendix
*Subhash Bose’ letter to Nehru on the latter’s keeping away from the Working Committee that Bose as President formed in 1939.
“Ever since I came out of internment in 1937, “I have looked upon you as politically an elder brother and leader and have often sought your advice. When you came back from Europe last year, I went to Allahabad to ask you what lead you would give us... you put me off by saying that you would consult Gandhiji and then let me know. When we met at Wardha after you had seen Gandhiji, you did not tell me anything...Twelve members resigned. They wrote a straight forward letter...But your statement-how shall I describe it? I shall ...simply say that it was unworthy of you...When a crisis comes, you often do not succeed in making up your mind...you appear as if you are riding two horses...I may tell you that since the Presidential election, you have done more to lower me in the estimation of the public than all the twelve ex-members of the Working Committee put together. Of course if I am such a villain, it is...your duty to expose me... But perhaps it will strike you that the devil who has been re-elected President in spite of the opposition of the biggest leaders including yourself...must have some saving grace.
“...I fail to understand what policy you have with regard to our internal politics...Now, what is your foreign policy, pray? Frothy sentiments an d pious platitudes... For some time past I have been urging on everybody...that we must utilise the international situation to India’s advantage...but I could make no impression on you or on Mahatmaji, though a large section of the Indian public approved of my stand....Another accusation you made...was that I adopted an entirely passive attitude in the Working Committee...Would it be wrong to say that usually you monopolised most of the time of the Working Committee?...To be brutally frank, you sometimes behaved in the Working Committee as a spoilt child and often lost your temper...What results did you achieve? You would generally hold forth for hours together and then succumb at the end. Sardar Patel...had a clever technique for dealing with you...let you talk and talk and ...ultimately finish up by asking you to draft their resolution. Once you were allowed to draft the resolution, you would feel happy...rarely have I found you sticking to your point till the last.... As a doctrinaire politician you have decided once for all that a Coalition Ministry is a Rightist move...What is the use of your sitting in Allahabad and uttering words of wisdom which have no relation to reality?...regarding Bengal, I am afraid you know practically nothing. During two years of your Presidentship you never cared to tour the province...We should have....a Coalition Ministry...I should now invite you to clarify your policy. I should also like to know what you are- Socialist or Leftist or centrist or Rightist or Gandhist or something else?
Nehru knew Gandhiji was his God-father, and that he alone could make him President of Congress or Prime Minister. His “socialism” was to gain popular applause and his conduct was to get power and keep it.
That Nehru could be verbose, indecisive and seemingly philosophical can be known from the following words of his : “....newspapers say that I have resigned from the Working Committee. This is not quite correct and yet it is correct enough (Nehru’s usual vagueness, indeciveness) .... The reason that impelled me to act as a I did differed in many ways from those that moved my colleagues..... I felt an overwhelming desire to be out of committees and to function as a I wanted to, without let or hindrance”. This diabolic attitude of Jawaharlal Nehru in relation to Subhash Chandra Bose the acknowledged leftist and socialist who dared to defy even Gandhi, made Nehru’s closest comrades and the Left move away from Nehru – Jayaprakash Narayan, Achyut Patwardhan, Ram Manohar Lohia and other leading socialists who would never again truly trust Nehru. Subhash Chandra Bose poignantly asked, “ who was he? how could he continue forever to ride two horses or more than two, Left Center Right? Or was he something else. : (Source: p-252 & 253 –Stanley Wolpert)