Memoirs of a warrior for truth (3)

Continued from page 2

Shamlal Jain of Meerut gave a mind boggling witness account to the Khosla Commission in this regard. Jain was the stenographer of Asaf Ali, the secretary of the INA defence committee during the INA trials in Red Fort. Jain stated that after receiving a secret message from Netaji, Nehru wrote a letter to the British Prime Minister Attlee. This letter was typed by Jain. In that letter, Pandit Nehru wrote:

Dear Mr Attlee,

I understand from a reliable source that Subhas Chandra Bose, your war criminal, has been allowed to enter Russian territory by Stalin. This is a clear treachery and betrayal of faith by the Russians. As Russia has been an Ally of the British-Americans it should not have been done. Please take note of it and do what you consider proper and fit.

Yours sincerely

Jawaharlal Nehru

Why did Nehru commit such an unbelievable act of betrayal towards Netaji? The evidence from the trials of the German and Japanese war criminals clearly explains the implications of marking Netaji as a war criminal to Attlee. Nehru was not ignorant about what it meant to give out to the British Government the secret about Netaji, who was considered as the enemy number one of the empire.

Nehru was a patriot and one of the leaders of the freedom struggle. His multifaceted talents were also universally acknowledged. But he could never imagine putting himself at the second position in the ranking of Indian leaders unless the first person concerned was Gandhi. He knew very well that Gandhiji would never sit on the throne of State power. Even with all his outstanding intellect Nehru was blind in his desire to become established as the icon of the highest State authority. He could never tolerate any challenge to this dream of his.

In the final stages of the debate over the formation of Pakistan, Gandhiji made a desperate bid to protect the historical and national unity of India. He proposed to Mountbatten that Jinnah be made the Prime Minister of India after transfer of India. Jinnah too started showing signs of agreement to this proposal. But Nehru exploded in anger when this proposal was placed in the meeting of Congress leaders. He was dead against it. As a result the last efforts of Gandhiji to stop India\\'s division failed.

Pandit Nehru was ruthless in case of any power struggle or at the possibility of any opposition. He accepted Mountbatten\\'s warning, that if Subhas Bose comes back no one will be able to stop him from being the supreme leader of the country, as the sterling truth. All Congress leaders, including Gandhiji, knew this well. The Indian public at that time was mesmerized by Netaji. Morarji Desai, a Gandhian, was always a political opponent of Bose during the days of freedom struggle. The same Morarji Bhai said to me in 1978, "Samar Guha, why are you saying Subhas Babu is alive? If he had returned to the country in 1946, he would have become all-in-all. There would have been no Nehru, none from the Nehru family. Subhas Babu would have been all-in-all."

Another fact regarding this became available in 1989. On Gandhiji\\'s instruction his trusted disciple and secretary Smt Khurshed Naoroji wrote a secret letter on 22 July 1946 to the American journalist Louis Fischer who was very close to Gandhiji. Informing Fischer about the state of opinion amongst the public and the British Indian Army, she wrote, "At heart the Indian Army is sympathetic to the Indian National Army. If Bose comes with the help of Russia neither Gandhiji nor the Congress will be able to reason with the country."

Nehru also knew that if Netaji came back to India, he would become all-in-all. Even the though of such a scenario was intolerable to him. Thus, the murky power struggles that has happened in history all over the world, was repeated just before the transfer of power in India. Not only did Nehru, out of his fear of being thrown out of power, make arrangements to keep Netaji in exile despite knowing he was in Russia, he did not hesitate to formulate a national policy of giving the living Netaji a political burial. He never spoke about Netaji on his own after he came to power. Neither did he care about the demands of the nation to find the truth about Netaji. The subsequent governments too have followed the same policy of cruel silence, indifference and efforts to put a veil on the Azad Hind Revolution and the life of its Supreme Commander.

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