India's biggest cover-up

by Anuj Dhar

  In his mind, conflicting thoughts were criss-crossing. Bose telling him in Saigon— “They are changing the plan, I don’t know why.” And Isoda comforting him later—“So long as I live, I would keep him safe”. Towards the end of his report, Das qualified his declamation with a sentimental appeal:

  As one who knows Japan for the last twenty years and has worked with brave Japanese people in the making of that glorious history under the banner of Netaji, my grateful heart goes to the Japanese people for all they did for us. INA’s history will not be complete without references to Japan’s contribution, service and sacrifice, which will remain written in golden letters. It is with such a feeling that I would appeal to the Japanese government and its people to see that their fair name be not marred with stigma in their relations with the INA and the Leader before posterity. Hence I appeal to them in fairness to their love towards India to allow such inquiries vis-à-vis the reported plane crash in Taihoku….[8]

  Das would have shed some of his suspicions against the Japanese and blown his top over India’s approach if he had by some chance glanced through Ayer’s complete report. The report that the PM had tabled in Parliament was a sanitised version of the original. Expunged from it—in deference to Subimal Dutt’s advice—was the portion where Ayer had referred to a secret, high-level Japanese plan to “drop Netaji and General Shidei at Dairen” in Manchuira.

  The intention was that General Shidei would look after Netaji in Dairen as long he remained there. Then Netaji would disappear with a view to crossing over to Russian-held territory and thereafter the Japanese would announce to the world that Netaji had disappeared.

  The more disturbing part was that the Prime Minister completely hid from the nation an explanatory handwritten note on the plan as narrated to Ayer by Colonel Tada, the former staff officer of Terauchi’s HQ who was party to working out Bose’s last known movement.

  Tada’s perspective of the ensuing incidents in August 1945 was of vital importance. It was he who had told Ayer of Bose’s death. He had briefed the HQ in Tokyo. His inputs had formed the crux of official Domei news agency story that Bose died while on his way to Tokyo. Tada’s surfacing along with Isoda just before Bose's “death” had made British intelligence officers suspicious. One report suggested that the duo could have turned up to execute a “deception plan”. As early as October 1945, Finney had emphasised the need to trace Tada. In March 1946, Mck Wright was told by Major Young that “our only worthwhile move is to get hold of Tada”.

  What Tada told Ayer in 1951, and what Ayer conveyed to Nehru in the handwritten note, proved that the intelligence about deception was right. Tada let out to Ayer that all the Japanese manoeuvrings in August 1945 were directed at sending Subhas Bose to the Russians. In his secret note—which doesn’t exist any longer officially—Ayer mentioned that Tada “filled certain important gap” in his information

  Soon Netaji & party (including myself) landed at the Saigon airport from two planes from Bangkok at about 10am on 17.8.45. Col Tada flew to Dalat, contacted Field Marshal Terauchi, Commander-in-Chief, Southern Command (starting from Burma to China and Manchuria) and conveyed Netaji’s request for facilities to fly to Russian occupied territory in Manchuria to enable him ultimately to reach Moscow.Netaji had been making this request to Tokyo ever since March or April 1945 and had been perusing it since the collapse of Germany…. Field Marshal took the responsibility on his own shoulders and without referring the question to the Imperial (Military) Headquarters in Tokyo, told Col Tada to tell Netaji that all facilities would be given to him to reach Russian-held territory.

  Count Terauchi had great respect and affection for Netaji and wished to let Netaji have his wish and do whatever he liked on his own responsibility, whatever the consequences might be. A plane was leaving for Diren and to Tokyo, Gen Shidei who had been ordered to proceed forthwith to Diren to take charge as Vice-Chief of Staff was going by that plane. Netaji could take the only seat they could spare and Gen Shidei would look after Netaji up to Diren. Thereafter Netaji would fall back on his own resources to contact the Russians....

  Japanese would announce to the world that Netaji on his way to Japan had disappeared from Diren. That would absolve them of all responsibility for the safety of Netaji’s person in the eyes of the Allies. Col Tada, on his return from Dalat at about 2 or 3pm conveyed this message to Netaji in a secret conference…. Count Terauchi had told Col Tada that if Tokyo asked him about Terauchi’s decision to help Netaji to reach Russian-held territory, Col Tada was to tell Tokyo that Terauchi had done so on his own responsibility.

  Terauchi couldn’t care less about Tokyo’s reaction. Terminally ill in August 1945, this 65-year-old son of a former prime minister knew that death would get him before the Allied “justice”. He passed away in 1946 while in custody. Tada slipped out and successfully evaded the Allied dragnet. He died prematurely in September 1951, around the same time Ayer’s report reached the PM.

  Ayer’s personal letters to Prime Minister at that time reeked of obsequiousness. But much as he addressed the PM as “revered Panditji” and described himself as his “most obedient servant” in the old-fashioned way, Ayer was kept at an arm’s length by the Prime Minister. In a letter to BC Roy, Nehru disparagingly described him as “one Ayer [who] was Publicity Adviser to Subhas Chandra Bose”. [9]

  Ayer’s findings as presented in Parliament were followed by his magnum opus Unto him a witness. Published in December 1951, the book contained some rare pictures of Bose. Ayer made deferential observations about Bose’s persona and leadership and drew an outline of the death mystery. But the readers never knew that his manuscript had been vetted by the Ministry of External Affairs. In a secret note, Foreign Secretary Subimal Dutt wished it was “arranged in a more effective manner”.

  Unto him a witness mentioned nothing that Tada had told Ayer—who later on, ironically, served on the censor board—showing a strange lapse of memory in an otherwise minutely detailed book. He discussed and ruled out the possibility of Bose being alive in a chapter which was barely three and a half pages long.

  Major Abid Hasan, Ayer wrote, “refused to believe Habib’s story” and was “sure that Netaji must have safely crossed over to the Russian-occupied Zone in Manchuria”. Then he mentioned—in just one line—that he visited Japan in May 1951 and met the crash survivors before abruptly giving his opinion that he was “convinced beyond the shadow of a doubt” that what Colonel Habibur Rahman had said was true. He missed telling the readers that Bose’s men were capable of concealing things. Elsewhere, in some other context, he recounted how Hasan had given him only a “scrappy account” of his 90-day submarine voyage with Bose. He put it rhetorically that there was no power on earth which could have detained Bose against his will.

  If Bose were alive, Ayer argued, he would have come back, or at least contacted the person closest to him—his elder brother Sarat Chandra Bose. He painted a “what if” scenario and ventured out to suggest that if Bose had returned, he would have gladly accepted the defence portfolio “if invited by Nehru” to join his Cabinet. [10]

  The purpose of Ayer’s enquiry report and the book was defeated as they only ended up giving impetus to the rising tide of the controversy. More and more people now yearned for a resolution. Former Bengal minister and lawyer Niharendu Dutt-Mazumdar mooted the idea of a “special fact-finding commission” in a January 1954 letter to Nehru. [11] The Prime Minister’s January 21 response was of a man hassled:

  I really do not understand what more the Government of India can possibly do about finding facts in regards to Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. We have done everything possible within our ken and got all the facts that were available. I have no doubt in my mind about them. [12]

  Six months later the issue simmered yet again in a meeting of Berhampur municipality commissioners. Giving in to public sentiments, the municipality adopted an extraordinary resolution urging the central government to carry out a “thorough inquiry in order to ascertain the trut
h and to dispel misgivings and misunderstanding”. [13] A copy of the resolution reached Teen Murti Bhawan, the Prime Minister’s palatial residence-cum-office. This time it was PM’s Private Secretary who slammed the door with the evident Nehruspeak:

  All the inquiries that the Government of India could make have been made and result is conviction that Shri Bose died in the fatal air crash. No further inquiries in the matter are considered necessary. [14]

  Secret official correspondence of the time shows the Government’s unshakeable belief in the Taipei air crash theory. When the Renkoji temple priest decided to hold first memorial service to mark ten years of Bose’s reported death, Indian Ambassador BR Sen scrambled to reach the South Block. His 26 July 1955 telegram began with the ritualistic, politically right phrase “late Subhas Chandra Bose”, which every top government official recited in those days.

  Chief Priest of Renkoji Buddhist temple who has all along had the custody of ashes proposes holding for first time formally a memorial service on the 18th August. Temple authorities ask Embassy approval for this and request presence of Ambassador and others at the occasion. Please advise action desired.

  The Ministry of External Affairs asked Sen to elaborate his views, asking him to refer to a June 1954 communiqué of his predecessor. Ambassador Rauf had written:

  Opinion of Indians here is divided. Any recognition, therefore, would be a source of controversy. It would not be so much matter about the Indians locally, but the opinion in Bengal refuses to accept the fact of Netaji’s death and, therefore, of the genuineness of the ashes. I would, therefore, suggest that so long as we call, we should try and keep things as they are until opinion in Bengal changes to accept the fact of his death.

  “My views generally same as Rauf's,” Sen’s return telegram read. “Main question is whether Government are in a position to publicly accept fact of death. If they are then there could be no objection to Embassy participating in memorial services here.” Sen’s views were conveyed to the Prime Minister, who swiftly issued the following instruction:

  The services were held and in attendance was AK Dar, First Secretary at the Embassy, who had been taking keen interest in the Bose matter.

  Either by coincidence or some unknown design, Bose’s fate became a hot topic both in Japan and India in the September of 1955. Renkoji temple priest’s decision to hold second memorial service for Bose on September 18 as per a Japanese custom and the Japanese government’s September 17 offer to send the ashes to India sparked off a huge controversy. The Indians in Japan demanded a full-fledged investigation into the death as well as missing INA treasure.

  “Alive or murdered? Indians seek truth about Chandra Bose” screamed a Nippon Times headline on 18 September 1955. “A treasure in gold and jewels donated by Indians all over Asia to finance the fiery Bengali leader’s fight for Indian independence was reported to have been in the plane with Bose, but nothing has been seen of it since,” said the story. Two days later, the same paper reported what clearly was an officially-backed attempt to cool down the simmering cauldron in Japan and India. News agency Domei, now called Kyodo, organised an extraordinary press conference where it paraded three former army officers who vouched for Bose’s death: Lt Gen Haruki Isayama, former chief of staff of the Japanese forces in Formosa, Capt Yoshimi, the doctor who had treated dying Bose and Col Morio Takakura of the Imperial Staff Headquarters in Tokyo. According to the newspaper, Kyodo

  produced the men after cries went up from the Indian community here this month insisting that Japanese authorities tear aside the veil of secrecy that has surrounded the death of their leader for the past decade and give an account of the missing treasure. ...Many still insist he is alive. Others believe he is dead but think he was murdered for the treasure. [15]

  Takakura’s statement to media took that charge by its horn. He turned the spotlight on Ramamurti recalling that he had “personally delivered Bose’s ashes and a fortune in gold and jewels to an official of the Indian independence movement in Tokyo”.

  “The fortune belonging to the Bose movement has since vanished.” [16]

  To further counter the conspiracy theory about Bose’s “murder” the officers were compelled to jettison the original Domei claim that Bose had died enroute to a trip to Tokyo. The Japanese finally accepted what the British intelligence had uncovered in 1945:

  According to the former army men quoted by Kyodo, Bose was being transported from Singapore to Russia to escape prosecution by the Allies. A Lt Gen Shidei, a Russian expert who was being transferred to the Manchurian theatre, was to see that Bose got to the Soviets. [17]

  Totally blind to the revelation about Russia, the Indian embassy saw the Japanese government hand behind the blitz. Dar noted on September 20 that “the Gaimusho [Japanese foreign ministry] are interested in having the ashes sent to India in order to close the still lurking suspicion in their mind that the Indians somehow hold the Imperial Japanese Government responsible for some negligence in not safeguarding the life of Netaji and the property of the INA which he was carrying”. On September 22, he sent a long telegram to New Delhi. “We suspect that Japanese are somehow anxious for transfer of the ashes and have therefore encouraged controversial publicity now.”

  At home, the Government’s stonewalling tactics was driving Bose’s supporters up the wall. It was a showdown in Kolkata on 6 September 1955 at a meeting of Netaji memorial committee, attended by the Red Fort trial hero Shah Nawaz Khan. Now a pucca Congressman, Shah Nawaz himself inadvertently triggered a backlash against the Government by telling the gathering that the Prime Minister was not ready for any official probe. It resulted in the adoptation of a resolution envisioning a public-funded inquiry into the mystery.

  If it had come into being, this civil society-led unofficial committee would have had for its head Justice Radha Binod Pal, the only Asian judge at the Tokyo war crimes trials. Pal’s pro-Japan judgment had been banned by the miffed Allies. Nevertheless, the Indian to occupy the highest position in Japanese esteem thereafter would be Pal. The judge already had some idea about the Bose death issue. He had been dramatically informed by a fellow American judge that the Taipei crash was “possibly a myth”. Pal discussed it publicly more than once. Writing to Japan-based freedom fighter AM Nair in 1953, he had rooted for a proper inquiry: “The whole thing demands a thorough investigation. Statements by individuals made here and there will not convince me as to the truth of the story given out. I have reasons to doubt its correctness.”

  In pursuance of the Kolkata resolution, Shah Nawaz Khan met Subhas’s eldest surviving brother Suresh Bose. Sarat had passed away in 1950. Shah Nawaz said he would take up the issue with the Prime Minister and seek official support for the civil society committee. He promised to be back soon with the plan of holding a big meeting of Bose’s supporters.

  He never did. Shah Nawaz was never seen again by the side of those who doubted the crash theory. The man who had once told a friend that a senior Japanese officer had confidentially told him not to worry about Bose as he was “safe”, gone to the other side. Several years later, a note in a Rajiv Gandhi-era file by Pulok Chatterji—the Principal Private Secretary to Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh at present—gave a testimonial to this incredible change of heart. “Shah Nawaz had himself declared on several occasions that Netaji is alive.”

  The Nehru government suddenly realised Shah Nawaz’s importance. There was a shift in the official position, which as late as 29 September 1955 remained stridently opposed to a proper probe. When Kamath asked Prime Minister Nehru in Parliament if the Government would welcome “a proposal for a joint Indo-Japanese commission,” he replied:

  I have said that the question of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose’s death is, I think, settled beyond doubt. There can be no inquiry about that. But so far as to the exact circumstances, possibly if there’s an inquiry held, it may be that some additional facts may come to notice.

  On 13 October 1955, Nehru made a note for the information and actio
n of his Foreign Secretary. He minuted that in consultation with BR Sen and Dr BC Roy he had decided to set up a team of three people to inquire into the matter. The team would comprise one representative each from the Government, INA and Bose family. The PM was inclined to nominate Amiya Nath Bose, son of Sarat Bose, but did not “think it necessary” to “consult Shri Subhas Chandra Bose’s wife in Vienna”. He defined the task before the proposed panel:

  The purpose of the inquiry will be to find the circumstances of the death and how far the ashes kept in a temple in Tokyo are Shri Subhas Bose’s ashes.

  The Foreign Secretary recorded his response two days later, suggesting that “an officer of the embassy should be associated with the committee but not as a member”. This was going to be AK Dar. A subsequent note by the PM said:

  I met Shri BR Sen, our Ambassador in Tokyo, in Calcutta this evening. I asked him to inform the Japanese Government informally that, in view of the great interest in India in regard to the circumstances of the death of the Shri Subhas Chandra Bose and in his ashes, it would be desirable to have some kind of an investigation in this matter so as to remove any doubts from people’s mind, about these circumstances…. If they are agreeable, as we hope they will be, then we propose to send a team of three persons who will place themselves at the disposal of the Japanese government and conduct an inquiry in Japan in cooperation with the Japanese government.

  …it is our intention to request Shri Amiya Bose, son of Shri Sarat Chandra Bose, and Shri Shah Nawaz Khan, Parliamentary Secretary and previously of the INA, to be two members of this team. The third should be an official either from the Government of India or West Bengal Government. The inquiry should be carried out without too much fuss or publicity.