Subhas
Chandra Bose (23 January 1897 – 18 August 1945), was an Indian nationalist whose defiant patriotism made him a hero in India, but
whose attempt during World War II to rid
India of British rule with the
help of Nazi Germany and Imperial
Japan left a troubled legacy. The honorific Netaji,
, first applied to Bose in Germany, by the Indian soldiers of the in Berlin, in early 1942, was by 1990
used widely throughout India. Indische Legion and by the
German and Indian officials in the Special Bureau for India.
His death near
Taiwan during World War II is still shrouded in mystery. But the various
conspiracy theories about it make it even more mysterious.
Netaji Subhash
Chandra Bose died in an air crash in Taipei on August 18, 1945, a Union Cabinet note 50 years later said amidst
the raging controversy over the INA chief's mysterious disappearance.
However,
many claim Bose did not die in that crash.According to one theory, he
planted his death hoax and returned back to India and became a Sadhu (Indian
renunciant) in a place Shoulmari in Bengal.
Here is a look back at some of the most intriguing conspiracy theories:
At 2 pm on August 17, 1945, a
Mitsubishi Ki-21 heavy bomber took off from Saigon airport. Inside the aircraft
were 13 people, including Lt Gen Tsunamasa Shidei of the Imperial Japanese
Army, Col Habibur Rahman of the Indian National Army and one man who sat in a
seat a little behind the portside wing – Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose.
After an overnight halt in Vietnam, on August 18, the
plane arrived to refuel in Taihoku, Formosa (now Taipei, Taiwan). Moments after
the flight took off again, passengers heard a loud ‘bang’. Ground crew saw the
portside engine fall off, and the plane crashed. The pilots and Lt Gen Shidei
were killed instantly, Col Rahman fell unconscious. Bose survived, but his
gasoline-soaked clothes ignited, turning him into a human torch.
A few hours later, in coma in a
hospital, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose passed away.
This
is the established account of how one of India’s most famous freedom fighters
died.
But
is it true? “There
were no official reports released by the Governments of India or Britain,”
historian Leonard Gordon says, “Even members of India’s Interim Government in
1946 waffled on the matter. Bose had disappeared several times earlier in his
life; so rumours began again in 1945 and a powerful myth grew.”
There are some Main Things about Netaji’s Death issue..
give a glance..
Government Efforts
(1945 - 2005)
The four-member Shahnawaz
Committee was the first official endeavor to examine whether Bose actually died
in a plane crash in Taihoku (Taipei) on August 18, 1945. The committee went to
Japan in May, 1956 and a number of Japanese army surgeons testified that they
actually conducted blood transfusion on a seriously injured Subhash Bose who
later succumbed to his injuries. The G. D. Khosla Committee, which carried on
its probe from 1974-1978, could not arrive on any definite conclusion. The
Justice Mukherjee Committe, set up in 1999, submitted its report in 2005 and
proclaimed that Netaji did not die in the plane crash.
The Sadhu story
In the 1950s,
there emerged stories that Netaji had become a sadhu. And, the most elaborate
of these took shape a decade later. Some of Netaji’s old associates formed the
‘Subhasbadi Janata’, and claimed Bose was now the chief sadhu in an ashram in
Shoulmari in North Bengal.
There
were claims that Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev told an interpreter in Delhi
that the Soviet Union could produce Bose in 45 days if India so desired.
Stalin killed Netaji…?
Most recently, the BJP’s Subramanian
Swamy has alleged that Bose did not actually die in a plane crash in 1945, but
was killed by Soviet dictator Josef Stalin in 1953.
“According to the papers that exist
with us, Bose had faked his death and escaped to Manchuria in China which was
under Russian occupation, hoping Russia would look after him. But Stalin put
him in a jail in Siberia. Somewhere around 1953, he hanged or suffocated Bose
to death,” said Swamy, demanding that the Netaji files be declassified.
However, he conceded,
“Declassification of Netaji documents in haste and without judging the
consequences would be difficult. India’s relations with Britain and Russia may
be affected.
“But I will persuade the Prime
Minister to disclose the documents.”
Gumnami Baba, aka
‘Bhagwanji’
Of all this, the most enduring legend
is of a sadhu in Faizabad whom the locals called Gumnami Baba, who went by the
name Bhagwanji.
Bhagwanji, they
say, was a monk who lived in Uttar Pradesh – Lucknow, Faizabad, Sitapur, Basti
and Ayodhya – for more than 30 years till his death on September 16, 1985. He
maintained contact with Dr Pavitra Mohan Roy, the former top Secret Service
agent of the INA.
More about Subash Chandra bose death
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