The Netaji

Home ● Sitemap ● Reference ● Last updated: 19-May-2009

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Introduction

Of all the charismatic and strong-willed politicians in pre-independence Calcutta none managed to inspire such unconditional adulation and uncompromising resistance as Subhas Chandra Bose. His radicalism in opposing the British fell on fertile ground with many of the younger generation of Calcutta. It also deeply divided the Congress Party in Bengal, and led to his isolation on a national level, as well as his frequent arrests by the British.

Even that however, could curb not stop his seemingly boundless energy, and his escape from Calcutta into exile in 1941 became another legend of his struggle. He had left the city which had been his anvil for decades (forever as it turned out), yet even from afar he managed to keep a strong hold on it.

Continuous rumours, propaganda leaflets and especially his broadcasts from Berlin and Japanese occupied South-East Asia, kept him alive to his numerous supporters and many enemies in Calcutta.

His mysterious disappearance at the end of the war finally completed his transformation from flesh and blood politician into national myth, a myth which still enthrals many in the city.

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1939 - Subhas Chandra Bose leaves the Congress Party at the Tripuri Congress

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

Nehru Out

Few Indian leaders have fought so hard, spent so much of their personal fortune, endured such jail sentences in the cause of Indian nationalism as has Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, Harrow- and Cambridge-educated Hindu Brahmin lawyer. Although calling himself a Socialist, Pandit Nehru has long played ball with Mahatma M. K. Gandhi's group of Rightists controlling the Indian National Congress, has compromised repeatedly, has twice been elected to the Congress presidency.

Last week Pandit Nehru refused any longer to compromise. Shortly after the recent re-election to the Congress presidency of Subhas Chander Bose, Bengal Leftist leader, over the opposition of M. K. Gandhi, the Mahatma withdrew his support from the organization he had long nurtured. Soon most of the other well-known leaders who had worked with Mahatma Gandhi followed suit. For Pandit Nehru, however, there was a difficult choice: he was doctrinally sympathetic toward Mr. Bose but his personal devotion to the Mahatma was intense. He finally chose devotion and, in a bitter letter to Mr. Bose, resigned.

Far from weakening the Indian independence movement, the resignations were expected to strengthen it. The rank and file of Congress members were already clamoring to oust them. Many of the old Congress high command resigned because they wanted to avoid the ignominy of dismissal. The Mahatma's spiritual appeal has long been powerful with the Hindu masses, but the radical Bose program, based on a frankly anti-British policy, has been strongly supported by Indian workers and peasants. For Britain there were definite signs of storms ahead. British viceroys and governors in India will no longer deal with "reasonable" Saint Gandhi and his followers but with the exacting, "unreasonable" Mr. Bose. And among the things Mr. Bose is known to have in mind to help "persuade" the British in India to give the country more self-rule are civil disobedience, a general strike, no-rent and no-tax campaigns.

(source: TIME Magazine, New York, Mar. 6, 1939)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with Time Magazine)

Coming Struggle

Dominant political party of India is the Indian National Congress. It boasts a paid-up membership of 4,500,000 (yearly party fee: 9ç), puts on spectacular demonstrations, governs, through the seats it holds in the provincial legislatures, nine of the eleven provinces of British India.* Periodically it scares British governors with threats of boycotts and passive resistance campaigns.

Biggest Congress personality is 69-year-old Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. Politically astute as well as religiously ascetic. Saint Gandhi has long been a virtual Congress dictator, his word being law and his selection of party officials final.

Squirming under the Gandhi thumb, however, has been a group of educated, progressive, Westernized young Indian Leftists. While admiring Saint Gandhi's past contributions to the cause, they have nevertheless deplored the fact that the Mahatma's closest advisers have long been a group of rich Hindu moneylenders and merchants, that the Saint is not even faintly inclined to socialist principles. They also take no stock in Mahatma Gandhi's belief that machines are wicked, that earthquakes are demonstrations of God's wrath and that the primitive Indian village life is the ideal way of living. And more significantly, they have lately come to believe that the Mahatma was far too prone to compromise with the British.

Politician Gandhi has usually softened the rebels' ardor by giving them big jobs in the party and then hamstringing them with trusted conservative advisers. Elected last year to the Congress presidency—with Saint Gandhi's blessing—was fiery young Subhas Chander Bose, a Bengal leader with a long record of terrorist activities. Considered at first a weakling in politics, President Bose soon began to kick at the Gandhi traces. He forced Millionaire Jamnalal Bajaj, good friend of Gandhi, to resign as Congress treasurer for "reasons of health." He curried to the masses by charging that Indian Congress officials had jailed trade unionists, used the British police to shoot strikers, limited civil liberties. Most serious charge of all, however, was that Gandhi was leading Congress to accept the federation of British India and the Indian States. This measure, advocated by the British but fought by all Leftist Indian leaders, would unite the semidemocratic British Indian provinces with the 562 autocratic native states in such a way that the British and their satellites, the princes, would have by far the biggest say in the government.

With President Bose's one-year term about up, Saint Gandhi looked around for a more tractable successor. Complicating factor, however, was that the President decided to run for another term, thus openly challenging the Gandhi leadership for the first time. First Gandhi nominee was bearded Persian Scholar Moulana Abul Kalam Azad, a Mohammedan. He promptly withdrew after being hooted out of a meeting. Nominee No. 2 was Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Gandhi's right-hand man. He also withdrew. Final choice was Dr. Patthabhi Sitaramayya of Madras, who received Saint Gandhi's and the Congress high command's endorsement, election seemed a sure thing.

Last week the delegates of the All-India Congress Committee met for the annual elections. Unexpectedly they turned thumbs down on Leader Gandhi's man, re-elected Leftist Bose, by a vote of 1,575-to-1,376. Saint Gandhi took his defeat hard. He charged fraud, claimed the Congress was fast becoming a "corrupt organization" and intimated that his supporters might bolt the Congress organization. The Mahatma himself is not a dues-paying member of Congress. To President Bose his re-election was simply a victory for anti-federation.

Many Britons have of late forgiven Saint Gandhi his past sins as leader of the anti-British movement and have come to regard him as one of their best friends. To them the Bose election was an unhappy augury of dire things to come, perhaps of future challenges to British power. Of particular significance was one of President Bose's recent statements: "We must launch a struggle!" Under Subhas Bose's direction a "struggle" might not be as bloodless as the civil disobedience campaigns of Mahatma Gandhi.

As an ominous beginning the All-India Committee passed a resolution demanding that India be allowed to write her own Constitution and urged sending to Britain a six-month ultimatum as the proper period for a reply to India's "national demand." Failing a satisfactory answer in that time, the Party would be free to take matters into its own hands.

*There are, in addition, 562 native states.

(source: TIME Magazine, New York, Feb. 13, 1939)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with Time Magazine)

Tagore, Gandhi and Bose

In August 1939 the Congress working committee had banned Subhas Chandra Bose from any congress office for three years. As before Tagore again tired to mend the rift between Bose and Congress, this time in a telegram to Mahatma Gandhi:

Santiniketan, [West Bengal, India]

20 December 1939

Owing gravely critical situation all over India and especially in Bengal would urge Congress working committee immediately remove ban against Subhash and invite his cordial cooperation in supreme interest national unity.

Rabindranath

Gandhi sent a reply telegram saying that the working committee could not lift the ban, saying 'My personal opinion is you should advise Subhas Babu [to] submit [to] discipline if ban is to be removed'

Rabindranath Tagore. Poet & Educationalist etc. Santiniketan, 20 December 1939

(source:p. 513 of Rabindranath Tagore, Krishna Dutta (ed.), Andrew Robinson (ed.): “Selected Letters of Rabindranath Tagore”. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. June, 1997)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with Rabindranath Tagore)

Storm Signals

MR Subhas Bose, the sitting President of the Congress, has been chosen for a second term as the rssiilr of a critical and keenly contested election. Bengal Congressmen, even those who turn to Wardha [Mahatma Gandhi's ashram.] rather than to Woodbum Park [* Sarat Bose's residence where Subhas lived.] for inspiration, will find a certain satisfaction in this All-India tribute to the Province's candidate. The contest, and the fact that there had to be a contest, are felt to be of significance. Mr Bose stated in advance with unmistakable emphasis what he considered the issue to be. It was, in his view, a fight between Right and Left on the Federation question. His opponent and his backers refused to accept this position. Congressmen, they hold, are agreed that India needs federation and must have it, but they are as far as Mr Bose from giving their approval to the scheme and the details of federation embodied in the Government of India Act. They had apparently their own reasons, which they did not particularize, for not thinking it advisable to elect Mr Bose to a second consecutive term of office. Mr Bose assumed that they were opposing him on a principle, but their statements gave the impression that his personality had something to do with it. Both estimates of the position seem to contain some truth.

H it is possible to crystallize the election in a sentence; it can be read as a defeat for Wardha. We have not read Mr Bose's book which has hitherto not been permitted to circulate in India, but is now to be available in the United Provinces—and we presume later elsewhere. But we have been told by those who have read it that it is very critical of much that Mr Gandhi stands for and that a political platform which supports both men may have some rickety planks. Pandit Nehru has on several occasions confessed his intellectual doubts of some of Mahatmaji's doctrines, but his heart which is with Mr Gandhi governs his head. That is a compromise which Mr Bose seems to have hitherto been unable to make.

Will Mr Base's triumph mean the disappearance' of the familiar figures of the "High Command" ? Will a new kind of Working Committee with new men now to be chosen ? Will Wardha cease to be the Congress capital ? For Congress Provincial Governments have the storm signals gone up.

(source: The Statesman. Calcutta/Delhi, January 30, 1939)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with The Statesman)

Tripuri

THE issue at Tripuri can, we think, be reduced to simple language by saying that it is between those who recognize where the menace to India's freedom comes from and those who do not. The "Left" wish to go on believing or pretending that Britain is the enemy. The "Right" know that to throw away self-government after it has been won in the Provinces, and undertake a struggle with Britain at a moment when the only issue left between Britain and India is the regulation of the time programme as regards full status, and when free institutions alike in Britain and India are in grave danger, is to work for Hitler, Mussolini and the Japanese War Lords. Every vote given against Pandit Pant's resolution at Tripuri was a vote for the Axis and the defeat of Democracy.

(source: The Statesman. Calcutta/Delhi, March 12. 1939)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with The Statesman)

Early Cracks

OUR readers may remember that on the day when Mr Subhas Bose's re-election as President of the Congress was announced we commented that, although it was an assertion by the so-called Left of its voting strength (our leader was entitled "One with His Left") and a temporary defeat for Wardha, the upshot would be different. We did not base this prophecy on any calculation of relative strengths in a struggle for power between two irreconcilable factions in the Congress. That struggle, since so eagerly fomented daily by partisans on either side in the Press and carried to preposterous lengths at Tripuri, has seemed to us deplorable. It is part of a dissolving view of a rapidly disintegrating India preparing to make itself anybody's easy meat for a meal. The Congress is split from top to bottom. The Moslems, and well they know it, are in not much better case.

(source: The Statesman. Calcutta/Delhi, April 28. 1939)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with The Statesman)

Bengal v The Rest

A MEMORABLE meeting of the A.I.C.C. has ended in the resignation of a President who three months ago was re-elected to a second term of office, and in the election in his place of Dr Rajendra Prasad. The issues in a prolonged struggle have at times seemed to the public obscure, but they have been very real. Certain forces have now won a decisive victory and certain other forces have lost out. Mr- Subhas Chandra Bose was made the standard-bearer of the forces which have lost and as a compromise proved impossible he has thought it best to resign.

But he has expressed his loyalty as a democrat to the Congress, and as an ex-President he is ex-officio a member of the. Working Committee. He has before him an important task which no one else can fulfil to the same extent.

Bengal has done itself a serious injustice. The politics of the Left in the Province have in the public mind of the rest of India become associated to an altogether undesirable extent with terrorism at some periods, with belief in violence whether of action or language in others, and in general with profound disbelief in the teachings of Mr Gandhi combined with willingness to exploit whenever possible his hold over the masses. A marked cleavage has been widening for years.

(source: The Statesman. Calcutta/Delhi, May 2, 1939)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with The Statesman)

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Forward Block

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

Shoes, Flags

So revered and respected has Mohandas K. Gandhi been that he has never felt the need of a bodyguard as he travels about India. Recently however, demonstrators in a Calcutta suburb booed at the wizened little old man. One even dared to throw a shoe which barely missed the Mahatma, hit his private secretary. This is India's worst insult. Later, the Mahatma was greeted at a station by a group carrying black flags—another Indian symbol of rebuke.

All this took place while the Mahatma toured Bengal, home province of fiery Subhas Chandra Bose, Indian Leftist leader whom the Mahatma ousted last year as president of the Indian National Congress Party. The Leftists, who think that now is the ideal time to snatch Indian independence away from war-beset Great Britain, have accused the Mahatma of too much dickering and stalling with the British.

The heat thus turned on him, last week St. Gandhi turned it on the British. His Working Committee of Congress threatened nationwide civil disobedience if Britain did not grant home rule instanter.

Moderate Indian nationalist opinion and Mr. Gandhi were obviously on the run. In prospect, unless the British talked very fast and convincingly, were the bad times of 1930-34.

(source: TIME Magazine, New York, Mar. 11, 1940)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with Time Magazine)

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

July 1940 - The Holwell Monument Agitation

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

July 1940 - Arrest

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

Message of Subhas Chandra Bose to his followers after his arrest

Forget not that the greatest curse for a man is to remain a slave. Forget not that the greatest crime is to compromise with injustice and wrong. Remember the eternal law: you must give life if you want to get it. And remember the highest virtue is to battle against iniquity, no matter what the cost might be.

Subhas Chandra Bose, Political Prisoner, 1940

(source: page 80 of Trevor Royle: “The Last Days of the Raj” London: Michael Joseph, 1989)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with Trevor Royle 1989)

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

September 1940 - Hungerstike

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

From Subhas Chandra Bose’s private message to J.A. Herbert Governor of Bengal

Though there may be no immediate tangible gain - no suffering, no sacrifice is ever futile. It is through suffering and sacrifice alone that a cause can flourish and prosper and in every age and every clime the eternal law prevails - 'the blood of the martyr is the seed of the church'. In this mortal world everything perishes and will perish, I but ideas, ideals and dreams do not. One individual may die for an idea but that idea will, after his death, incarnate itself in a thousand lives.

Subhas Chandra Bose, Political Prisoner, 1940

(source: page 80 of Trevor Royle: “The Last Days of the Raj” London: Michael Joseph, 1989)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with Trevor Royle 1989)

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

December 1940 - House arrest

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

17/18 Jan 1941 - Escape from Housearrest

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

Exit Mr. Bose

Since wealthy onetime Indian National Congress President Subhas Chandra Bose was jailed last July, becoming the first big-time martyr of Mohandas Gandhi's new drive for Indian self-determination, he has been itching to get back into action. In November he thought up a perfectly legal device. Elected a member of the Indian Legislative Assembly, he requested release long enough for the formal swearing-in ceremony. But the British Raj flatly denied the appeal.

Next he went on a hunger strike, vowed he would lay down his life in defiance of British defense regulations and the way they are enforced in India. His health grew so bad that the alarmed British, afraid he might die in jail, transferred him to his luxurious home on Elgin Road in the European section of Calcutta, under guard of C. I. D. operatives. There he professedly abandoned his faith in European medical science, took up yoga exercises with such fervor that friends feared for his sanity.

One day last week servants entered his private chamber, found his bed empty and no sign of their master anywhere. Worried relatives suspected kidnapping, or suicide touched off by an unbalanced mind. But the wary Government issued a special warrant for his rearrest, anxiously awaited new signs of civil disobedience directed from underground by sharp-witted Subhas Chandra Bose.

(source: TIME Magazine, New York, Feb. 10, 1941)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with Time Magazine)

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

“I am off; you go back”, was all that he said at the end

“At one of the stops, we sat and watched from under the cover of a tree, a long procession of bullock carts pass by. The music created by the ringing bells on the necks of the animals provided a strange background to what wass pehps the greatest adventure in our contemporary national history. We had our second stop nearer our destination among flowering rice fields, bathed in bright moon light with the hill of Pareshnath in the distance. As we moved closer to the Gomoh railway station, the road became rather difficult and when we entered the station yard it was about time for the train to arrive. My brother and I got the three pieces of luggage out and shouted for a porter. One sleepy fellow eventually came out of the porter’s shed and picked up the things.

“I am off; you go back”, was all that he said at the end. They waited till the Kalka-Delhi Mail steamed off from Gomoh railway station. “

Sisir Kumar Bose, Nephew of Subhas Chandra Bose editor of the Statesman. Gomoh railway station, 18^th Jan 1941

(source: page 145-146, Subodh Markendeya: “Subhas Chandra Bose; Netaji’s Passage to Immortality”. New Delhi: Arnold Associates 1997)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with Subodh Markendeya)

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The way to Germany

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

A Vanishing Trick

AN official statement that Mr Subhas Bose has gone over to the enemy and is with the Axis Powers was lately made in the Assembly, but a large section of the Indian Press has professed incredulity. It demands evidence beyond the circulation of leaflets in this country, printed in the enemy's interest, which have obtained the assurance lhat Mr Bose is with the Axis.

We give Mr Bose the credit for sincerity for saying what he means and meaning what he says. Mr Bose's views are those of the Nazis, and he makes no secret of it. Some people in this country are as unwilling to believe that he is sincere or to take the trouble to read his book, as the appeasers were to believe Hitler was in earnest or to bother about Mein Kampf,

Mr Bose gives reasons why Communism will not be adopted in India, and indicates clearly his preference for Fascism. But there are certain traits common to both which he likes and therefore what he really looks for is a synthesis of Communism and Fascism. This he thinks is what India in particular needs.

If therefore Mr Subhas Bose is with the Nazis—and the German radio claimed to know his whereabouts as early as last January—he is where he belongs. He is honester than those who now put up a smoke-screen of disbelief. Proceeding's by the Bengal Government on a charge against him were, we believe, pending at the time and he was under police surveillance. How came it that he was allowed in disappear?

(source: The Statesman. Calcutta/Delhi, November 19, 1941)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with The Statesman)

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Meeting Hitler

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The India Centre

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Legion Freies Indien

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Netaji's Broadcasts & Propaganda

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

Japanese Leaflet

collected by Malcolm Moncrieff Stuart, I.C.S. (Indian Civil Service), Calcutta, 1942

(source: personal scrapbook kept by Malcolm Moncrieff Stuart O.B.E., I.C.S. seen on 20-Dec-2005 / Reproduced by courtesy of Mrs. Malcolm Moncrieff Stuart)

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

By U-Boat to Japan

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

21 October 1943 - Azad Hind Government

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

Wavell and the Golden Throne

At New Delhi last week, Viscount Wavell of Cyrenaica and Winchester took office as India's 19th Viceroy. The ceremony was as simple as Lord Wavell's brisk arrival by plane, as austere as the task he now faces.

Not till the viceregal flag broke out over the palace dome was the public aware that Field Marshal Lord Wavell had mounted the golden throne. Within jasper-columned Durbar Hall, he had taken the three great oaths: 1) the oath of allegiance to King-Emperor George VI; 2) the oath as Governor-General of British India; 3) the oath of Viceroy representing the Crown to the autonomous Indian States. In that nine-minute ceremony, he had also attained a sumptuous $10,000,000 palace; a job paying in salary and expenses about $280,000 a year; the top appointive post in all the British Empire's glittering hierarchy; direct power unrivaled by any king on earth, rivaled only by a few dictators; and a set of administrative burdens in scale with his viceregal grandeur.

The Bellies. Heaviest of the burdens was the oldest one—the weight of India's 390,000,000 Moslems and Hindus of many castes, divided amongst themselves, in chronic ferment against the British Raj and all that the Viceroy represents. Lord Wavell had followed monolithic Lord Linlithgow, the outgoing and unregretted 18th Viceroy, into office at a time when the Raj was at its lowest point yet in both Indian and British esteem. Many of India's millions, ordinarily unstirred by and unaware of the political issues which engross the articulate minority, felt in their bellies a failure of the Raj. They were starving.

Famine gripped large areas of India (TIME, Oct. 18). Three days after his inauguration, Field Marshal Lord Wavell announced that he would visit hunger-plagued Calcutta, where whole families were dying on the streets. The Bengal Government was one of several provincial Governments which had dallied at commandeering rice crops and stocks, and distributing them to the hungry. Lord Wavell has the power to do so for all of India, and the Central Government has already threatened to override dilatory provincial authorities if necessary. But, even with the utmost vigor on his part, a solution will be difficult.

Cure and Spot. Last month Lord Wavell announced in England a three-point India policy. The points, in the order of importance and timing which he assigned them, were: 1) the organization of India for the complete defeat of Japan; 2) the raising of social standards throughout India; 3) the gradual transfer of political power to Indian hands.

Lord Wavell's bluntness in putting Indian independence last on the list showed no desire to placate anyone. It did show a realistic approach to the fact that India is an important Allied military base as well as a shaky pillar of Empire. But the same bluntness was bound to alienate many Indians before he had mounted the throne. Indians could—and did—point out that a starving India could be neither an efficient base nor a willing ally. With no real evidence as yet, they were already branding him as another imperialist whipping master. And many Britons at home, horrified at the failure of the Raj to control the famine, were loud-voiced for the release of the Congress leaders jailed by Linlithgow, the removal of Indian Secretary Leopold Amery.

The hero of Cyrenaica had been in some tough spots, had won triumphs and survived reverses in Africa and Greece. On the golden throne of the Viceroy, he was in the toughest spot in all the Empire.

The Imponderable Mr. Bose

In Singapore last week a "provisional government of India" was set up by the Japanese. Its chief: Subhas Chandra Bose, ex-President of the Indian National Congress. Its first intention to declare war on Britain and the U.S.

Cherub-faced lady-killer Bose has long been a friend to the Axis. In 1941, faced with prosecution by the British, he fled India, later cropped up wining & dining with Axis leaders in Berlin and Tokyo, plumped for Fascism. Broadcasting to discontented India over Axis frequencies, Bose once said: "... In December 1941... but one cry arose from the lips of the brave soldiers of Nippon: 'On to Singapore!' Comrades, let your battle cry be 'On to Delhi!"

(source: TIME Magazine, New York, Nov. 1, 1943)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with Time Magazine)

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The INA

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta_________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

Kadam kadam barhae ja

kadam kadam barhae ja

khushi ke git gae ja

ye zindagi hai kaum ki

tu kaum pe lutae ja

(Step by step

march forward with joyful song,

This life is of the fatherland,

sacrifice it to the fatherland)

tu sher Hind age barh

marne se kabhi na dar

falak talak uthake sar

joshe vata n barhae ja

himmat teri barhti rahe

khuda teri sunta rahe

jo samne tere are

tu khak men milae ja

chalo Dilli pukar ke

kaumi nishan samhal ke

Lal kite pe gar ke

lahrae ja lahrae ja

Marching song of the INA

Renegade's Revenge

Thoughtful men thought twice when they learned that sardonic, myopic Subhas Chandra Bose, traitor, was with the Japs around Imphal. Twice President of the Indian National Congress and long the loudest foe of British rule in India, Bose's name was wildly cheered in Delhi after Bose himself had turned up in Berlin seeking Hitler's aid in freeing India. That was August 1942.

By last October Bose had worked his way to Singapore via Tokyo. He proclaimed a "Provisional Government of India," set about recruiting an "army of liberation," was tireless in his praise for Jap assistance in the task. When the time came to threaten Allied communications with southeast Asia, the Japs dubbed Bose a general and took him along with his "army of liberation." Through the heavy folds of British censorship in New Delhi came word that Bose's forces numbered some 3,000 men; others, freer to speak the truth, guess that he may have as many as 30,000 Indians from Malaya and from Jap prison camps. More important than the size of his army was one explosive fact: an armed, anti-British Indian stands today on Indian soil and calls upon his fellows to rebel against the Raj.

Skillful lawyer, shrewd polemicist, Cambridge-educated Bose speaks and writes with logic and persuasion. In Indian politics, he used to rank at least No. 3, after Gandhi and Nehru, and for some he still is No. 1. His theme of Samyavada (equality) with no room for the idle rich has charm for millions of unhappy Indians. He emphasizes a single-party state and authoritarian discipline.

Beyond the prongs of the Jap advance into little Manipur lies the sprawling province of Bengal, Bose's home. Beyond the immediate threat to Allied arms lies the chilling possibility that the Japs mean what they say when they promise 350,000,000 Indians immediate independence. Well may the canny Japanese recall how Kaiser Wilhelm shoved Lenin into a tottering Russian empire, watched him bring the structure down.

(source: TIME Magazine, New York, Apr. 17, 1944)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with Time Magazine)

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

“Did you ever hear of the INA?”

No, not by those initials, or by any other identification. We were quite isolated from local political turmoil at that time. I do not recall being aware of any local, or national, political groups at any time while in CBI. We had our own problems, so paid little attention to strictly Indian politics.

Glenn Hensley, Photography Technician with US Army Airforce, Summer 1944

(source: a series of E-Mail interviews with Glenn Hensley between 12^th June 2001 and 28^th August 2001)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced by permission of Glenn Hensley)

As for Chandra Bose, there’s a statue of him in Calcutta and I wouldn’t mind putting a bomb under it if I’d got one

You see, all these philosophical points, you only have to think about when the occasion occurs, and the only other thing I would like to say is, how wonderful the Indian troops were that fought with us. They were promised that if they fought with us against the Japs, everybody knows about the Sieks etc. but there were thousands of other regiments that fought for us against the Japs. We said, “If you’ll help us, if you come in with us, against the Japs, you will get independence at the end of the war. And they are the people that fought for Indian Independence. There were Indians who side with the Japs, because the Japs said, “If you come and side with us to beat the British, we’ll turn them out, you’ll get independence. Anybody who believed that from a Jap, wanted their brains testing. They treated Asian prisoners worse than white prisoners. They despised Asians, so they certainly weren’t going to fight for them to give then their country back. This upsets me when they say Chandra Bose was a freedom fighter to free India. He did not free India. The people that freed India were the men who fought for us. As for Chandra Bose, there’s a statue of him in Calcutta and I wouldn’t mind putting a bomb under it if I’d got one. No, but it’s not right. The people that sided with the Japs were not really fighting for Indian independence. How could anybody, knowing how the Japs behaved, think the Japs were going to fight for India then give them India? How could they?

Dr. Ivy Oates.

Dr. Ivy Oates, doctor, Calcutta, August 1945

(source: A3890225 A Woman Doctor (Part Three) Edited at BBC WW2 People's War' on http://www.bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar/ Oct 2006)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with the original submitter/author)

Gandhi’s noble action

In all, I was in India forty-three years, and my opinion of the Indian people stands very high, in spite of all my hardships from time to time.

The war with Japan in the early 1940s was a hard trial for India, as there were many Indians who wished the downfall of the British Empire and, in 1942, it was near open rebellion.

Mahatma Gandhi, at that time, showed his real, true nature. He had the sway of the masses and when the ill-feeling toward Britain was at its highest, he stood firm and announced:

'It will be to India's lasting shame and disgrace if she stabs England in the back when she is so sorely pressed, fighting the fight other life for the freedom of nations.'

His cry was heard and upheld, and the Indians followed his advice; and, instead of revolting, rallied around the old British flag and put their manpower and resources at England's disposal. I think that was a most noble action, especially from Mahatma Gandhi's side, considering all he had suffered at their hands during his long and bitter fight for India's freedom.

August Peter Hansen, Customs Inspector, Calcutta 1942

(source: page 207 of August Peter Hansen: “Memoirs of an Adventurous Dane in India : 1904-1947” London: BACSA, 1999)

(COPYRIGHT NOTICE: Reproduced under 'fair dealing' terms as part of a non commercial educational research project. The copyright remains with 1999 Margaret [Olsen] Brossman)

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

21 May 1945 - Netaji Subhas Bose's last broadcast from Bangkok

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

17 August 1945 Netaji Subhas Bose's plane crashes near Taihoku in Taiwan

_____Pictures of 1940s Calcutta________________________

_____Contemporary Records of or about 1940s Calcutta___

_____Memories of 1940s Calcutta_______________________

Return to top

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Home ● Sitemap ● Reference ● Last updated: 19-May-2009

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

If there are any technical problems, factual inaccuracies or things you have to add,

then please contact the group under info@calcutta1940s.org