On Subhas Chandra Bose's birth anniversary in January 2016, the prime minister of India inaugurated the declassification of Central government files relating to the deceased patriot. This was done - as is this prime minister's wont - with great pomp and show, with Narendra Modi going himself to the National Archives, television cameras following his every step and gesture. A hundred files were released that day, with (so we were promised) a further twenty five to be released every month thereafter.
The release of the files was not prompted by any commitment to historical truth or transparency. Indeed, shortly after coming to power, Narendra Modi's government had destroyed a staggering 1.5 lakh files in the home ministry. (What incriminating evidence some of these files may have contained remains a matter of speculation.) But, in the case of Subhas Bose, the National Democratic Alliance government was persuaded by a group of crank researchers that the files in the National Archives might show (i) that Bose did not die as claimed in an air crash in Taiwan in August 1945; (ii) that the Congress government led by Jawaharlal Nehru had disrespected Bose's memory by covering up details of his life and death.
It is now a year since the process of releasing the files was begun. The 1,200 files that have emerged so far have confirmed none of the conspiracy theories. And they have decidedly refuted one; for, far from disrespecting Bose's memory as the cranks alleged, Nehru, in fact, acted honourably in sanctioning an allowance from the public exchequer for Bose's daughter, Anita, who lived in Austria.
This column, published as we approach the next anniversary of Subhas Bose's birth, explores some forgotten facets of that great patriot's relationship with an even greater patriot, Mahatma Gandhi. Based on firm historical evidence, it debunks another myth associated with Bose - that Gandhi and he were implacable rivals and even enemies.
It is true that Bose and Gandhi had one famous and substantial disagreement. This was when Gandhi opposed Bose's re-election as Congress president in 1939. However, for at least a decade-and-a-half before that, Bose admired Gandhi enormously, seeing him as the pre-eminent leader of the freedom struggle. Indeed, even during the exchange of letters that led to his resignation as Congress president, Bose told Gandhi he would "yield to none in my respect for his personality", adding that "it will be a tragic thing for me if I succeed in winning the confidence of other people but fail to win the confidence of India's greatest man."
Gandhi once compared swaraj to a bedstead with four sturdy posts: these being Hindu-Muslim harmony, the abolition of untouchability, economic self-reliance and non-violence. Bose endorsed the first three ideals whole-heartedly, while disagreeing about the last. It was because he did not entirely believe in non-violence that he led the Indian National Army. Even so, it is a remarkable fact that of the four brigades of the INA, three were named after Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Maulana Azad (the fourth was named, after he yielded to his sycophants, after Bose himself).
Even when in uniform, Subhas Bose continued to admire his old Congress comrades; and Mahatma Gandhi most of all. On October 2 1943, Subhas Bose spoke over the radio from Bangkok. This, he reminded his Indian listeners, was the 75th birthday "of their greatest leader, Mahatma Gandhi". His address rehearsed Gandhi's contributions; how, when he started his non-co-operation movement in 1920, "it appeared as if he had been sent by Providence to show the path to liberty. Immediately and spontaneously the whole nation rallied round his banner."
In the twenty-odd years since Gandhi emerged as the nation's leader, continued Bose, Indians had "learnt national self-respect and self-confidence". They had also "now got a country-wide organisation representing the whole nation". The "service which Mahatma Gandhi has rendered to India and to the cause of India's freedom", said Bose, "is so unique and unparalleled that his name will be written in letters of gold in our National History - for all time".
When Bose made this speech, Gandhi was in prison in Poona. Gandhi was released in May 1944; and Subhas Bose died a year later. In 1945-46, Gandhi met many soldiers who had worked with Bose in the INA. Their idealism and courage impressed him, bringing back warm memories of his old comrade. Speaking to the United Press of India in January 1946, Gandhi endorsed the adoption of the Indian National Army's slogan, ' Jai Hind (glory to India)', noting that just because it had been used in war, it need not "be eschewed in non-violent action". As for Bose himself, Gandhi remarked that he "always knew of his capacity for sacrifice. But a full knowledge of his resourcefulness, soldiership and organizing ability came to me only after his escape from India". He added: "The difference of outlook between him and me as to the means is too well known for comment."
Later, in 1946, Gandhi went to Noakhali in eastern Bengal after riots had broken out there. His peace mission there is well known; what is not so well known is that he was given vital assistance by a band of Sikhs, led by Niranjan Singh Gill and Jiwan Singh, both former officers of the Indian National Army. The sturdy Sikhs helped move luggage from village to village, erected temporary shelters, and repaired and drove motor vehicles.
In Noakhali, Hindus were the main sufferers. Meanwhile, in equally horrific violence in Bihar, Muslims were the principal victims. So Gandhi decided to go there next. However, before he arrived in Bihar himself, Gandhi sent a former major general of the Indian National Army, Shah Nawaz Khan. Shah Nawaz and six other INA men worked with Muslim refugees, rebuilding their homes and villages. Shah Nawaz said he "had been told by Mahatmaji that the success of our work in Bihar would have a good effect on the whole of India and might even be a cure against the poison of communalism which is destroying the country". Some officials obstructed their work, but this stopped when Gandhi arrived. "Mahatmaji's presence and speeches in Bihar", observed Shah Nawaz, "have had a good effect on the masses of Bihar. Their attitude with me was very cooperative. They were prepared to listen to Mahatmaji and make his work a real success".
As in Bengal, Gandhi was deeply moved by what the INA soldiers had done to restore communal peace. "Shah Nawaz Saheb is doing this work very well," said Gandhi in a prayer meeting in Bihar. He then described how Shah Nawaz and his team of former INA soldiers distributed food to the riot victims, so shaming the Hindus that they volunteered to help the Muslims harvest their crops. Hearing of this, the Muslims who had fled to Bengal began returning to Bihar.
The soldiers and officers of the Indian National Army resettled and reassured vulnerable Hindus in Bengal, and they resettled and reassured vulnerable Muslims in Bihar. Their work should (to invoke Bose on Gandhi) be 'written in letters of gold in our National History - for all time'. But it remains largely forgotten today.
To be sure, the later careers of some INA officers are not entirely unrecorded. Shah Nawaz Khan himself served several terms as a member of parliament (from Meerut), fighting for justice for peasants. Also moderately well known is Captain Lakshmi Sahgal, once of the INA's Rani of Jhansi regiment, a selfless doctor who ministered for many years to labourers and their families in Kanpur, and who was chosen as their candidate by the Left for the presidential elections of 2002.
Whether in Bihar, Bengal or Uttar Pradesh, these INA men and women who worked in independent India were equally inspired by Bose and by Gandhi. For after India became free in 1947, the one thing that divided the two men became redundant. Now what united them mattered far more - namely, a deep and selfless patriotism, a total commitment to Hindu-Muslim harmony, to the abolition of poverty and drudgery, and to the ending of caste and gender distinctions.
The claim of the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh to admire Subhas Bose are utterly spurious. But today's Congress has no claim on him either. And merely the fact of Bose being Bengali gives the Trinamul Congress no special privilege - for, like Gandhi himself, Bose was no narrow parochialist. In fact, both Bose and the Indian he most admired, Gandhi, belong to no party whatsoever. They belong rather to all those who are willing to work, as Niranjan Singh Gill, Shah Nawaz Khan and Lakshmi Sahgal once so nobly did, for an India where religious and ethnic minorities are safe and secure, and where women and Dalits can be full and equal citizens of the land.
