On August 18, 1945, three days after the end of World War II in the eastern theatre of war, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose died following a plane crash in Taipei (then occupied by Japan). His remains were cremated there and taken to Tokyo. The community of Indian exiles who had made their home there arranged for the urn to be kept (and hidden from the US occupation forces) at Renkoji Temple temporarily — maybe a few months or a few years, at the most. Today, almost 80 years later, and more than 77 years after India became independent, Netaji’s remains are still honoured at Renkoji Temple. With Rev Mochizuki, the third generation of head priests exercises this function.
At the time of Netaji’s death and shortly thereafter, a large part of the world was in total upheaval. Communication was archaic compared to today’s standards. There were several parties interested in ascertaining what truly happened to Netaji: Did he really die? Or did he manage an adventurous escape once again, as twice before (from India in disguise in 1941 and from Germany by submarine in 1943)? But the investigations carried out shortly after the accident took place were kept classified for many decades. Not surprisingly, various speculations about what might have happened to him on and after August 18, 1945, made the rounds. Over time the results of the earlier investigations became declassified and further inquiry commissions were set up, three alone — in 1956, 1979 and 1999 — by the Indian government. Ten reports concluded that Netaji died during the night of August 18, following a plane crash in Taipei. Only the last Indian inquiry by the Justice Mukherjee Commission arrived at inconclusive results. But this report, for strange reasons, contains many mistakes, inconsistencies and incorrect statements. When asked about the errors in a personal conversation with members of Netaji’s family, Justice Mukherjee admitted the fact but was not willing to talk about it. We must, therefore, accept the fact of Netaji’s death, despite a variety of fantastic speculations of what “might or could have happened”. While for some these speculations may be motivated by genuine affection for an iconic leader, let us not forget that an author can also make a lot of money by publishing stories of mysterious occurrences! And mysteries may offer more entertaining reading than dry reports or academic treatises on the subject.
Many Japanese governments and many Japanese admirers of Netaji wanted the Indian government and his family to take custody of Netaji’s remains in his motherland India. In the 1990s, Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao and his foreign minister, later Rashtrapati, Pranab Mukherjee, with the support of Netaji’s widow and his daughter, initiated a return of the leader’s remains. However, before this could be achieved, their government fell, and the following government abandoned the idea and acceded to the request of other followers and other family members to set up the Justice Mukherjee Commission of Inquiry in 1999 to look into the circumstances of Netaji’s death once again. The Mukherjee Commission worked for about six years till the new government finally demanded the submission of the report. The government did not accept this report.
This short sketch of what happened should show that the members of most governments felt that a decisive step like having Netaji’s remains handed over by the Japanese government, could not definitely be to their advantage. They had to fear an ugly controversy between followers and family members who were convinced of Netaji’s death in 1945 and those who were not. After all, one cannot blame politicians, dependent on the support of voters, for not willingly placing themselves in the middle of an unnecessary controversy (The fact that Netaji’s brother Suresh Chandra Bose, as a member of the first Indian investigation into his brother’s death, had first initialled the draft report, concluding Netaji’s death in 1945, but then submitted a dissenting report of his own, of course led to additional controversies in his family and the public).
Meanwhile, after all or almost all relevant documents about Netaji’s death have been available to the interested public for several years, the evidence in support of the fact and the date of his death is overwhelming. When the first government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi declassified the last Indian documents pertaining to Netaji and his family and Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee did the same in Bengal, persons in doubt, who had hoped that something might be found in those documents, had to accept that no conspiracy had been hushed up.
Netaji was deeply devoted to his motherland and his compatriots. He was willing to sacrifice everything to see India free. Since this was not achieved during his lifetime, he deserves to be allowed to return to his country at least posthumously.
The writer is the daughter of Subhas Chandra Bose
