India's biggest cover-up

by Anuj Dhar

  The commission set aside the Hyderabad lab report because it was inconclusive but asked the CFSL director to appear before it. The CFSL director did so only after summons were served on him thrice. His bias was also evidenced by the fact that he had ignored the commission’s repeated calls to figure out if it was possible to lift latent fingerprints from Bhagwanji’s belongings. Moreover, the director was quite gung-ho about the feasibility of a DNA test on the Renkoji remains, something that the other eminent experts—from Sir Alec Jeffreys to Lalji Singh—ruled out completely.

  Amazingly enough, as early as 2000, the CFSL Kolkata was talking of a scientific “breakthrough”—a sort of thing which rarely, if ever, happens in a third world country. According to a Times of India report, the “scientists here [at CFSL] claim to have hit upon a more sophisticated version of DNA testing, which, they said, could help them prove conclusively if the remains kept at the Renkoji temple in Japan are actually of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose”. The director was quoted in the report as making a tall claim that “recently we have mastered the technology and with this breakthrough we are now able to do what forensic centres in Washington in US or Birmingham in UK are doing”. [18]

  After the director’s cross-examination before the Mukherjee Commission, one deponent pointed out—and I find some force in this argument—that the entire procedure of gene profiling starting from DNA isolation till the analysis of the microsatellite repeats was conducted by one expert, that is the director himself. This went against the norms of DNA testing. “If an analyst has a mala fide intention, the result of DNA analysis can be manipulated, especially in the absence of a second examiner and interpreter,” said deponent Dr Madhusudan Pal during the argument session of the Mukherjee Commission.

  “So you suspect Bhagwanji DNA tests were fudged?”

  It would not be entirely unjustified to have that sort of feeling. In view of the overall credibility of the government labs and the mala fide intentions of the Government which runs them, either fudging or contamination of samples can’t be ruled out.

  “Is that possible?”

  Around 1999 the CFSL performed a DNA test on remains presumed of Paul Wells, a British national kidnapped along with others by the terrorists in J&K. According to a report published in the Independent of London, in January 2000 the J&K Police “announced that scientists on the Central Forensic Science Laboratories in New Delhi and Calcutta had confirmed through DNA testing of samples of bones and other body parts that this was indeed the body of Mr Wells”. [19] To verify the claims made by the CFSL labs, the British carried out their own tests. The Foreign Office in London later announced that “British police forensic scientists had decided that the remains were neither those of Mr Wells nor of any of the other hostages”. [20]

  “Why should we believe those foreigners?”

  Out of a misplaced sense of patriotism ordinary people like us may want to stand by “our” report, but throughout the world everyone will go for the British report. Even our own ruling class, top bureaucrats, soldiers, intellectuals, journalists, everyone—whose children’s favourite destination for study, work and permanent domicile is more likely to be London or New York than Mumbai and New Delhi—won’t give a fig to a report from an Indian lab when another one from the West is at hand.

  That’s why every time there is some forensic test involved in some contentious matter in India, the parties involved try to seek opinion of the experts from the US and Europe. Recently we saw how everyone ignored the Delhi CFSL report on the audio tapes floated with a view to tarnishing the reputation of former minister and civil society activist Shanti Bhushan and went with the one approved by an independent American expert. Later, Vir Sanghvi followed his suit and managed to take the Radia tape taint off him by getting two American and one British experts to establish that the recording of his conversation had been doctored.

  In hindsight, the handing over of these teeth to government agencies was a mistake. The Government of India has from the start displayed no genuine interest in resolving the Netaji issue. All the inquiry panels, including the Mukherjee Commission, were constituted by it under pressure and not out of a free will. It continues to withhold several secret files on Bose’s death and has no intention to share them with their real owners—the people of India. It has even destroyed, forged and hushed up evidence. Its intentions are not to resolve the issue but to cover it up. No reliance, therefore, can be placed on the reports given by the labs directly or indirectly controlled by the Government. All forensic tests concerning any aspect of the Bose mystery must be carried out in independent labs in Europe or America to ensure impartiality.

  “But some scholars, Forward Bloc leaders and members of Netaji’s family are insisting that the DNA test and the handwriting reports have conclusively proven that Bhagwanji was not Bose and we should close that chapter!”

  Most of these people have convinced themselves that Bose was killed in the USSR even though there is not a shred of evidence to back the allegation. The logic that rejects the Bhagwanji angle just because government forensic reports have falsified it or the UP government rejected it is not only greasy but also fraught with pitfalls. When the believers in the “Netaji was killed in Siberia” theory are reminded that the governments of India and Russia don’t even admit that he was there in the first place, they say that these governments are not being truthful. When a government is acting like that, how can you accept as gospel its opinions, and those of the people on its payroll, on the other aspects relating to the Bose mystery? Why have this “pick and choose” policy to suit your own prejudices? Do you want to know the truth about Bose, or do you want the truth as you think it is?

  I don’t think that any opinion expressed by the authorities is trustworthy given the political ramifications of the controversy around Bose’s fate. That is why the official stands concerning the Russian or Shaulmari angles are as much irrelevant as is the case with the Faizabad episode. I do not accept that Shaulmari sadhu was Bose merely because I have gone through some secret official papers saying so. I do so because there is independent evidence to substantiate that view. The government records are most vital while forming opinions, but the official views expressed in them must be taken with a pinch of salt for they may represent the thinking of a biased political leadership. My interest in seeking secret government records is only to understand whether or not Netaji died in 1945 or if he was alive afterwards. I have no faith in the Government's assessment about what he was and what he stood for. Every child in India knows that the Government of India never had any special love for Bose. By government I mean the political leadership controlling the system.

  The Bose family members who are now making adverse remarks about Justice Mukherjee for his pro-Bhagwanji stance should check out their own past comments about his unprejudiced inquiry. A member of the family said at a gathering that he agreed with the DNA test on “Bhagwanji’s teeth” conducted in the CFSL Kolkata. I asked him how would he react if the Renkoji remains were brought to India and tested at the same lab. I reminded him that the lab operated directly under the Ministry of Home Affairs which had been indicted in the Mukherjee Commission report for not fully cooperating with it. His response was that he did not trust the government machinery and would prefer that such a test be carried out in an independent lab. He did not appreciate it when I told him that we were of the same mind after all.

  "One last question: Why did the BJP not bring the whole thing out?"

  It’s for the BJP to answer. To be fair to the party, the Vajpayee government did do the country a favour by setting up the commission, though acting on a court order. The case would have been doomed if there was a Congress government at the helm in 1998-99. But why would the BJP not go beyond a point beats me. Continuity in government policies could be a factor, and it is not easy to overturn a stance that has been held across decades. Maybe the BJP leadership determined that the truth was not worth the trouble. Yes a large number of people scattered all ove
r the globe are deeply interested to know the truth, but a resolution of the mystery is not going to have any significant bearing on the electoral fortunes of any party in India.

  There is one calculated guess that I can make. The inside story may not be as simple as many people think it is. If the case was really of an open and shut variety like “Bose was killed in Russia and our people connived at this”, some non-Congress Prime Minister would have got it out and stigmatised the party for ever.

  There is definitely more to the Bose mystery than the Russian angle and it is quite complicated. And there’s no way we can hope to resolve it, unless a full-fledged debate is going on in the true Indian way. When the MPs are raising a stink in Parliament, people are carrying out candlelight vigils, celebrities are issuing appeals, intellectuals are making right noises on the TV, newscasters are grilling the ministers live, the Prime Minister and major leaders are asked straight questions during press briefings—that will be the day.

  In the forlorn hope that such a time might come, I’d do well to try and leave a brief account of the life and times of Bhagwanji—the man many believed was Bose. This is in addition to what has been discussed previously. In view of unverifiable and massively incredible details that are currently available, this is going to be sketchy and jump from one episode to another. So my apologies in advance; I know very little.

  First of all, what was the secret of the “concocted” air crash story as per “Dead Man” Bhagwanji? In Oi mahamanaba asey Charanik gives Bhagwanji’s purported account of how on August 17 evening “he” first parted from his associates. The allusion to “Japanese general” is perhaps for General Isoda and “youngest general and adjutant” is clearly Habibur Rahman—who was just 32 in 1945.

  Many (of his own side) were not trusted by him, but he kept them under the impression that they were the closest and most trusted. He finished all his work and then came out of his room. …The Japanese general became restless—no more delay. Mahanayak now came to his generals. Everyone was anxious to know who would accompany him. Each person’s expressions spoke out that he was the sole appropriate candidate to be with him. But he who had to choose had already made his choice. He said…“my foreign friends have allowed only one extra seat. I am taking with me my youngest general and adjutant”. [Translated from Bangla]

  It appears from Bhagwanji’s statements that “he” never went to Taipei. He parted company from his fellow travellers, probably in Tourane. Charanik writes:

  He had to get down at a predetermined place. It was planned that he would get some rest there. But suddenly there were signals that some people were following. Even a moment’s delay could not be allowed. Mahanayak now bade farewell to his trusted adjutant.He told the adjutant, “Remember my direction...I can’t tell you everything in detail. But I have told everything to two of my very trusted Japanese generals. Get the directions from them and act accordingly. Tell them if you need anything.”

  Mahanayak then left for an unknown destination. Long time later, Mahanayak commented, “Yes my adjutant was a complete man. Perhaps that is why he did not have any place in free India. At least I do not know of anyone else who has followed orders with such unshaken dedication.” [Translated from Bangla]

  Bhagwanji’s “unknown destination” was bhalu-desh—the land of bears—and he reached there with the additional help of “black society”. Soviet Russia was “the land of bears” and “black society” was a coinage for the secretive Black Dragon Society, whose former head’s son-in-law Rash Bihari Bose had handed over the charge of the INA to Subhas.

  Charanik asked a rhetorical question at this point: “Does anyone know that he went to the land of bears before his last trip?”

  If you asked historians, they would tell you that Bose passed through Russia in 1941, and never thereafter did he chance to be in Russia. But the same historians also said that Bose died in Taiwan. So shall we believe the historians or can we repose some of our trust in the unknown entity called Charanik?

  This medium of Bhagwanji’s further claimed that Mahanayak actually “met the leader of that country and made all arrangements” before 18 August 1945.

  This would have to be complete nonsense because in the last few months before the war ended, Bose did not move around much. Actually he did not even visit Tokyo. The Shah Nawaz Committee report states, and it is well known, that “in October 1944 Netaji visited Japan for the third and last time”. [21]

  But what if I told you that what you see now is an intelligence report speaking of a visit in December 1944?

  SACSEA Commission No 1 report of 6 November 1945—declassified and available in the National Archives in New Delhi since 1997—opens with the statement that “in December 1944, Subhas Chandra Bose suggested that it would be expedient for the Japanese government to come to terms with Chiang-Kai-Shek and further seek friendship with Russia”. Where and when he said that is made more clear in the second para of point 2: “There are indications that the Japanese government evinced a keen interest when Bose put forth these suggestions and in fact, plausible as these looked to them, it was in this connection that Bose visited Tokyo on December 44.” [22]

  So does it, or does it not prove that there has been some sort of secret history about Netaji that the historians are yet to fathom?

  “You are reading too much in one document and it could be, for all we know, a typo! I can already see a grammatical error in the report.”

  Perish the thought. Another record in the archives, declassified the same year, even speaks of a rumour about Bose’s secret visit not just to Tokyo but to Russia. Charanik had an edge over the historians.

  In November 44 there was a general rumour…that SC Bose was preparing to leave for Moscow in order to place all information about the Indian freedom movement before the leaders of the USSR. …In December 1944, Lt Sadhu Singh of HQ, 1 Div, INA, was acting as QM of the YE-U rest Camp, informed B 766 that SC Bose had left for Moscow and was soon expected back in Tokyo. [23]

  "This is only a rumour!"

  There's no smoke without fire. Another dot to connect comes from now missing Top Secret note AM Sahay had sent to the Ministry of External Affairs in 1952. He wrote: "While I was visiting Shanghai in January 1945, Netaji passed that way on his way back from Tokyo."

  For reasons he never explained publicly, Suresh Bose made a similar claim before the Khosla Commission. He hadn’t mentioned this in his Dissentient report, so he must have come to know it afterwards. Who could have informed him? A Times of India report dated 6 November 1970 quoted him saying that Bose’s plan to go to Russia “was drawn up in early 1944 and it was accepted by the Japanese government”. [24] In pursuant of this plan, what Subhas did next according to Suresh was reported by Hindustan Times:

  In December 1944, when the Azad Hind Government was functioning and the INA was engaged in the battlefields, Netaji was absent from there for about a fortnight. During this period, Netaji had been to Russia and had probably met Marshal Stalin. [25]

  A noting made by Pabitra Mohan Roy showed Bhagwanji as having said exactly the same thing and more. That the “disappearance was planned by him” much before the Japanese surrender. “Even before that he went to ‘R’ and nobody knew.” The note further said that days after the news of the crash was circulated, “he” was seen by petty Japanese officers and some “Anglo-American personnel” at “a small hotel near Saigon”. A note scribbled by Bhagwanji referred to “American intelligence officer Alfred Wagg” coming to know about a post-18 August 1945 meeting where “he” was present.

  Another cryptic remark of Bhagwanji. He claimed that General Douglas MacArthur had sent an identical message to President Harry Truman and Louis Mountbatten, supreme Allied commander for Southeast Asia. “Subhas Chandra Bose has escaped again.”

  But no record of any such message is in existence as of today. The MacArthur Archives at Norfolk has only one record indirectly concerning Bose in its declassified lot.

  I am sorry I am going to p
ile you with more and more even as you have difficulty in digesting the remark attributed to MacArthur. Bhagwanji took a leap two decades ahead as he said that

  as long as McNamara was in a key government position he kept quiet. But after becoming the chairman of IMF he said, “We have categorically different news regarding the publicized death story of so and so". [Translated from Bangla, except the highlighted words]

  Robert McNamara, who died recently at 99, was the US Defence Secretary (1961-68) and then the World Bank chief from 1968 to 1981. I have not yet come across any statement attributed to McNamara, substantiating Bhagwanji’s incredible statement in any which way.

  In his numerous talks with the close followers, Bhagwanji repeatedly spoke about his experiences in Siberia. Charanik, on his part, narrated this in Oi mahamanaba asey:

  Concentration camps of central Siberia contain male and female labourers, farmers, craftsmen, authors, scientists and teachers—from five thousand to 25 thousand people. Not one or two, there are almost 49 concentration camps. They manufacture ultramodern goods for daily use. These are transported to the retail outlets from the main city. Those who buy these do not know that they have been manufactured by their parents, brothers and sisters and other kin.

  One day a new camp was being constructed; so the soldiers took 10,000 prisoners with them. But there was no hut there. Their duty was to install pillars by digging 12 feet deep holes in the ice. “Keep your back hot by heavy work”—anyone who does not follow this will freeze and die. All this is not hearsay. Mahakaal has experienced all this. [Translated from Bangla]