Subhas Chandra Bose Subhas Chandra Bose Born23 January 1897 Cuttack, Orissa Division, Bengal Province, British India 18 August 1945 [ 1 ] Taipei(Taihoku), Japanese Taiwan [ 1 ]Died IndianNationality University of Calcutta University of CambridgeAlma mater Figure of Indian independence movementKnown for TitlePresident of Indian National Congress(1938) Head of State, Prime Minister, Minister of War and Foreign Affairs of Provisional Government of Free Indiabased in the Japanese-occupied Andaman and Nicobar Islands(1943–1945) Political party Indian National Congress1921–1940, Forward Blocfaction within the Indian National Congress, 1939–1940 HinduismReligion Spouse(s)or companion, [ 2 ] Emilie Schenkl (secretly married without ceremony or witnesses in 1937, unacknowledged publicly by Bose. [ 3 ]) Anita Bose PfaffChildren Bose familyRelatives Signature Subhas Chandra Bose( listen ; 23 January 1897 – 18 August 1945(aged 48) [ 1 ]) was an Indian nationalist whose attempt during World War IIto rid India of British rulewith the help of Nazi Germanyand Japanleft a troubled legacy. [ 4 ] [ 5 ] [ 6 ]The honorificNetaji( Hindustani language: Respected Leader), first applied to Bose in Germany, by the Indian soldiers of the Indische Legionand by the German and Indian officials in the Special Bureau for Indiain Berlin, in early 1942, is now used widely throughout India. [ 7 ] Earlier, Bose had been a leader of the younger, radical, wing of the Indian National Congressin the late 1920s and 1930s, rising to become Congress President in 1938 and 1939. [ 8 ]However, he was ousted from Congress leadership positions in 1939 following differences with Mohandas K. Gandhiand the Congress high command. [ 9 ]He was subsequently placed under house arrest by the British before escaping from India in 1940. [ 10 ] Bose arrived in Germany in April 1941, where the leadership offered unexpected, if sometimes ambivalent, sympathy for the cause of Indias independence, contrasting starkly with its attitudes towards other colonised peoples and ethnic communities. [ 11 ] [ 12 ]In November 1941, with German funds, a Free India Centre was set up in Berlin, and soon a Free India Radio, on which Bose broadcast nightly. A 3,000-strong Free India Legion, comprising Indians captured by Erwin Rommels Afrika Korps, was also formed to aid in a possible future German land invasion of India. [ 13 ]During this time Bose also became a father; his wife, [ 3 ]or companion, [ 2 ] Emilie Schenkl, whom he had met in 1934, gave birth to a baby girl. [ 3 ] [ 11 ]By spring 1942, in light of Japanese victories in southeast Asia and changing German priorities, a German invasion of India became untenable, and Bose became keen to move to southeast Asia. [ 14 ] Adolf Hitler, during his only meeting with Bose in late May 1942, suggested the same, and offered to arrange for a submarine. [ 15 ]Identifying strongly with the Axis powers, and no longer apologetically, Bose boarded a German submarine in February 1943. [ 16 ] [ 17 ]In Madagascar, he was transferred to a Japanese submarine from which he disembarked in Japanese-held Sumatrain May 1943. [ 16 ] With Japanese support, Bose revamped the Indian National Army(INA), then composed of Indian soldiers of the British Indian army who had been captured in the Battle of Singapore. [ 18 ]To these, after Boses arrival, were added enlisting Indian civilians in Malaya and Singapore. The Japanese had come to support a number of puppet and provisional governments in the captured regions, such as those in Burma, the Philippinesand Manchukuo. Before long the Provisional Government of Free India, presided by Bose, was formed in the Japanese-occupied Andaman and Nicobar Islands. [ 18 ] [ 19 ]Bose had great drive and charisma—creating popular Indian slogans, such as Jai Hind,—and the INA under Bose was a model of diversity by region, ethnicity, religion, and even gender. However, Bose turned out to be militarily unskilled, [ 20 ]and his military effort was short lived. In late 1944 and early 1945 the British Indian Armyfirst halted and then devastatingly reversed the Japanese attack on India. Almost half the Japanese forces and fully half the participating INA contingent were killed. [ 21 ]The INA was driven down the Malay Peninsula, and surrendered with the recapture of Singapore. Bose had earlier chosen not to surrender with his forces or with the Japanese, but rather to escape to Manchuria with a view to seeking a future in the Soviet Union which he believed to be turning anti-British. He died from third degree burns received when his plane crashed in Taiwan. [ 22 ]Some Indians, however, did not believe that the crash had occurred, [ 23 ]with many among them, especially in Bengal, believing that Bose would return to gain Indias independence. [ 24 ] [ 25 ] The Indian National Congress, the main instrument of Indian nationalism, praised Boses patriotism but distanced itself from his tactics and ideology, especially his collaboration with Fascism. [ 26 ]The British Raj, though never seriously threatened by the INA, [ 27 ] [ 28 ]charged 300 INA officers with treason in the INA trials, but eventually backtracked in the face both of popular sentiment and of its own end. [ 29 ] [ 26 ] [ 6 ] Early life: 1897–1921 Subhas Bose, standing, extreme right, with his large family of 14 siblings in Cuttack, ca. 1905. Jankinath Bose, Subhas Boses father, was a prominent and wealthy lawyer in Cuttack. Subhas Bose (standing, right) with friends in England, 1920 Bose as a student in England preparing for his Indian Civil Serviceentrance examination, ca. 1920. Bose ranked fourth among the six successful entrants. Subhas Chandra Bose was born on 23 January 1897 (at 12.10 pm) in Cuttack, Orissa Division, Bengal Province, to Prabhavati Devi and Janakinath Bose, an advocate. [ 30 ]He was the ninth child of a total of fourteen siblings. He was admitted to the Protestant European School like his other brothers and sisters in January 1902. He continued his studies at this school which was run by the Baptist Mission up to the year 1909 and then shifted to the Ravenshaw Collegiate School. The day Subhas was admitted to this school, Beni Madhav Das, the then Headmaster of the school, understood how brilliant and scintillating was the genius of this little boy. After securing the second position in the matriculation examination in 1913, he got admitted to the Presidency Collegewhere he studied briefly. [ 31 ]His nationalistic temperament came to light when he was expelled for assaulting Professor Oaten for the latters anti-India comments. He later joined the Scottish Church Collegeat the University of Calcuttaand passed his B.A. in 1918 in philosophy. [ 32 ]Bose left India in 1919 for England with a promise to his father that he would appear in the Indian Civil Services(ICS) Examination. He went to study in Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, and matriculated on 19 November 1919. He came fourth in the ICS examination and was selected but he did not want to work under an alien government which would mean serving the British. As he stood on the verge of taking the plunge by resigning from the Indian Civil Service in 1921, he wrote to his elder brother Sarat Chandra Bose: Only on the soil of sacrifice and suffering can we raise our national edifice. [ 33 ]Finally, he resigned from his civil service job on 23 April 1921 and returned to India. [ 34 ] With Indian National Congress: 1921–1932 Bose at the inauguration of the India Society in Praguein 1926. Bose at his residence in Calcuttain the late 1920s. Subhas Bose, GOC (General Officer Commanding) of the Congress Volunteer Corps (in military uniform) with Congress president, Motilal Nehru, who is taking the salute. Annual meeting, Indian National Congress, December 29, 1928. Subhas Chandra Bose with Congress Volunteers, 1929 He started the newspaperSwarajand took charge of publicity for the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee. [ 35 ]His mentor was Chittaranjan Daswho was a spokesman for aggressive nationalism in Bengal. In the year 1923, Bose was elected the President of All India Youth Congress and also the Secretary of Bengal State Congress. He was also editor of the newspaper Forward, founded by Chittaranjan Das. [ 36 ]Bose worked as the CEO of the Calcutta Municipal Corporationfor Das when the latter was elected mayor of Calcutta in 1924. [ 37 ]In a roundup of nationalists in 1925, Bose was arrested and sent to prison in Mandalay, where he contracted tuberculosis. [ 38 ] In 1927, after being released from prison, Bose became general secretary of the Congress party and worked with Jawaharlal Nehrufor independence. In late December 1928, Bose organized the Annual Meeting of the Indian National Congressin Calcutta. [ 39 ]His most memorable role was as General Officer Commanding (GOC) Congress Volunteer Corps. [ 39 ]Author Nirad Chaudhuriwrote about the meeting: Bose organized a volunteer corps in uniform, its officers being even provided with steel-cut epaulettes ... his uniform was made by a firm of British tailors in Calcutta, Harmans. A telegram addressed to him as GOC was delivered to the British General in Fort William and was the subject of a good deal of malicious gossip in the (British Indian) press. Mahatma Gandhi being a sincere pacifist vowed to non-violence, did not like the strutting, clicking of boots, and saluting, and he afterwards described the Calcutta session of the Congress as a Bertram Mills circus, which caused a great deal of indignation among the Bengalis. [ 39 ] A little later, Bose was again arrested and jailed for civil disobedience; this time he emerged to become Mayor of Calcuttain 1930. [ 40 ]During the mid-1930s Bose travelled in Europe, visiting Indian students and European politicians, including Benito Mussolini. He observed party organisation and saw communism and fascism in action.[ citation needed]In this period, he also researched and wrote the first part of his book The Indian Struggle, which covered the countrys independence movement in the years 1920–1934. Although it was published in London in 1935, the British government banned the book in the colony out of fears that it would encourage unrest. [ 41 ]By 1938 Bose had become a leader of national stature and agreed to accept nomination as Congress President. Pasumpon Muthuramalinga Thevarknown for his close friendship with Nethaji Subash Chandra Bose. Illness, Austria, Emilie Schenkl 1933–1937 Bose convalescing in Bad Gastein, Austria, after surgery in early 1933. Bose with Emilie Schenkl, in Bad Gastein, Austria, 1936. Bose in the Himalayan resort town of Dalhousie, India(June 1937), where he was convalescing, receiving Mirabehn, a disciple and emissary of Mahatma Gandhi, who had been sent by Gandhi to enquire about his health. From left to right are shown: Bose, Dr. N. R. Dharamvir (Boses friend and physician), Mirabehn, and Mrs. Dharamvir. Bose, Indian National Congresspresident-elect, center, in Bad Gastein, Austria, December 1937, with (left to right) A. C. N. Nambiar(who was later to be Boses second-in-command in Berlin, 1941–1945), Heidi Fulop-Miller, Emilie Schenkl, and Amiya Bose. With Indian National Congress 1937–1940 Bose, the president-elect of the Indian National Congress, arrives in Calcutta on 24 January 1938 after a two-month vacation in Europe where he had spent one and a half months with Emilie Schenklat the spa resort of Bad Gastein, [ 42 ]and had secretly married her on 26 December 1937. [ 43 ] Congress president Bose with Mohandas K. Gandhi at the Congress annual general meeting 1938. Bose at the LahoreCity Railway Station on 24 November 1938. Bose arriving at the 1939 annual session of the Congress, where he was re-elected, but later had to resign after disagreements with Gandhi and the Congress High Command. He stood for unqualified Swaraj(self-governance), including the use of force against the British. This meant a confrontation with Mohandas Gandhi, who in fact opposed Boses presidency, [ 44 ]splitting the Indian National Congressparty. Bose attempted to maintain unity, but Gandhi advised Bose to form his own cabinet. The rift also divided Bose and Nehru. Bose appeared at the 1939 Congress meeting on a stretcher. He was elected president again over Gandhis preferred candidate Pattabhi Sitaramayya. [ 45 ] U. Muthuramalingam Thevarstrongly supported Bose in the intra-Congress dispute. Thevar mobilised all south India votes for Bose. [ 46 ]However, due to the manoeuvrings of the Gandhi-led clique in the Congress Working Committee, Bose found himself forced to resign from the Congress presidency. [ 47 ]On 22 June 1939 Bose organised the All India Forward Bloca faction within the Indian National Congress, [ 48 ]aimed at consolidating the political left, but its main strength was in his home state, Bengal. U Muthuramalingam Thevar, who was a staunch supporter of Bose from the beginning, joined the Forward Bloc. When Bose visited Madurai on 6 September, Thevar organised a massive rally as his reception When Subash Chandra Bose was heading to Madurai, on an invitation of Muthuramalinga Thevarto amass support for the Forward Bloc, he passed through Madras and spent three days at Gandhi Peak. His correspondence reveals that despite his clear dislike for British subjugation, he was deeply impressed by their methodical and systematic approach and their steadfastly disciplinarian outlook towards life. In England, he exchanged ideas on the future of India with British Labour Partyleaders and political thinkers like Lord Halifax, George Lansbury, Clement Attlee, Arthur Greenwood, Harold Laski, J.B.S. Haldane, Ivor Jennings, G.D.H. Cole, Gilbert Murrayand Sir Stafford Cripps. He came to believe that an independent India needed socialist authoritarianism, on the lines of Turkeys Kemal Atatürk, for at least two decades. Bose was refused permission by the British authorities to meet Atatürk at Ankarafor political reasons. During his sojourn in England, only the Labour Party and Liberalpoliticians agreed to meet with Bose when he tried to schedule appointments. Conservative Partyofficials refused to meet Bose or show him courtesy because he was a politician coming from a colony. In the 1930s leading figures in the Conservative Party had opposed even Dominionstatus for India. It was during the Labour Party government of 1945–1951, with Attlee as the Prime Minister, that India gained independence. On the outbreak of war, Bose advocated a campaign of mass civil disobedience to protest against Viceroy Lord Linlithgows decision to declare war on Indias behalf without consulting the Congress leadership. Having failed to persuade Gandhi of the necessity of this, Bose organised mass protests in Calcuttacalling for the Holwell Monument commemorating the Black Hole of Calcutta, which then stood at the corner of Dalhousie Square, to be removed. [ 49 ]He was thrown in jail by the British, but was released following a seven-day hunger strike. Boses house in Calcutta was kept under surveillance by the CID. [ 50 ] In Nazi Germany: 1941–1943 Bose greeting Heinrich Himmler(right), head of the SS, and the Gestapo, 1942. Bose (2nd from left) talking to Himmler and other Nazi officials. Bose and Himmler continuing their discussion over refreshments. A photograph from the German Federal Archives, whose caption says, The ceremony, which took place on the occasion of the founding of the Indian National Provisional Government of Free India Centre at the Hotel Kaiserhofin Berlin (16 November 1943), turned out to be a flaming indictment of the British war hunger in India. In addition to numerous leading German personalities, the Japanese ambassador, General Oshima and the Republican-fascist Italy, his excellence Anfuso, attended the event. Shown here is the Secretary of State in the Foreign Office, Keppler, bringing greetings and wishes of the Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop. Bose meeting Adolf Hitler Boses arrest and subsequent release set the scene for his escape to Germany, via Afghanistanand the Soviet Union. A few days before his escape, he sought solitude and, on this pretext, avoided meeting British guards and grew a beard on the night of his escape. He dressed as a Pathan to avoid being identified. Bose escaped from under British surveillance at his house in Calcutta on 19 January 1941, accompanied by his nephew Sisir K. Bose in a car that is now on display at his Calcutta home. [ 51 ] [ 52 ] He journeyed to Peshawarwith the help of the Abwehr, where he was met by Akbar Shah, Mohammed Shah and Bhagat Ram Talwar. Bose was taken to the home of Abad Khan, a trusted friend of Akbar Shahs. On 26 January 1941, Bose began his journey to reach Russia through British Indias North West frontierwith Afghanistan. For this reason, he enlisted the help of Mian Akbar Shah, then a Forward Bloc leader in the North-West Frontier Province. Shah had been out of India en route to the Soviet Union, and suggested a novel disguise for Bose to assume. Since Bose could not speak one word of Pashto, it would make him an easy target of Pashto speakers working for the British. For this reason, Shah suggested that Bose act deaf and dumb, and let his beard grow to mimic those of the tribesmen. Boses guide Bhagat Ram Talwar, unknown to him, was a Soviet agent. [ 51 ] [ 52 ] [ 53 ] Supporters of the Aga Khan IIIhelped him across the border into Afghanistanwhere he was met by an Abwehr unit posing as a party of road construction engineers from the Organization Todtwho then aided his passage across Afghanistan via Kabulto the border with Soviet Russia. After assuming the guise of a Pashtuninsurance agent (Ziaudddin) to reach Afghanistan, Bose changed his guise and travelled to Moscow on the Italian passport of an Italian nobleman Count Orlando Mazzotta. From Moscow, he reached Rome, and from there he travelled to Germany. [ 51 ] [ 52 ] [ 54 ]Once in Russia the NKVDtransported Bose to Moscowwhere he hoped that Russias traditional enmity to British rule in India would result in support for his plans for a popular rising in India. However, Bose found the Soviets response disappointing and was rapidly passed over to the German Ambassador in Moscow, Count von der Schulenburg. He had Bose flown on to Berlinin a special courier aircraft at the beginning of April where he was to receive a more favourable hearing from Joachim von Ribbentropand the Foreign Ministry officials at the Wilhelmstrasse. [ 51 ] [ 52 ] [ 55 ] In Germany, he was attached to the Special Bureau for India under Adam von Trott zu Solzwhich was responsible for broadcasting on the German-sponsored Azad Hind Radio. [ 56 ]He founded the Free India Center in Berlin, and created the Indian Legion(consisting of some 4500 soldiers) out of Indian prisoners of war who had previously fought for the British in North Africaprior to their capture by Axis forces. The Indian Legion was attached to the Wehrmacht, and later transferred to the Waffen SS. Its members swore the following allegiance to Hitler and Bose: I swear by God this holy oath that I will obey the leader of the German race and state, Adolf Hitler, as the commander of the German armed forces in the fight for India, whose leader is Subhas Chandra Bose. This oath clearly abrogates control of the Indian legion to the German armed forces whilst stating Boses overall leadership of India. He was also, however, prepared to envisage an invasion of India via the USSR by Nazi troops, spearheaded by the Azad Hind Legion; many have questioned his judgment here, as it seems unlikely that the Germans could have been easily persuaded to leave after such an invasion, which might also have resulted in an Axis victory in the War. [ 54 ] In all, 3,000 Indian prisoners of war signed up for the Free India Legion. But instead of being delighted, Bose was worried. A left-wing admirer of Russia, he was devastated when Hitlers tanks rolled across the Soviet border. Matters were worsened by the fact that the now-retreating German army would be in no position to offer him help in driving the British from India. When he met Hitler in May 1942, his suspicions were confirmed, and he came to believe that the Nazi leader was more interested in using his men to win propaganda victories than military ones. So, in February 1943, Bose turned his back on his legionnaires and slipped secretly away aboard a submarine bound for Japan. This left the men he had recruited leaderless and demoralised in Germany. [ 54 ] [ 57 ] Bose lived in Berlin from 1941 until 1943. During his earlier visit to Germany in 1934, he had met Emilie Schenkl, the daughter of an Austrian veterinarian whom he married in 1937. Their daughter is Anita Bose Pfaff. [ 58 ]Boses party, the Forward Bloc, has contested this fact. [ 59 ] In 1943, after being disillusioned that Germany could be of any help in gaining Indias independence, he left for Japan. He travelled with the German submarine U-180around the Cape of Good Hopeto the southeast of Madagascar, where he was transferred to the I-29for the rest of the journey to Imperial Japan. This was the only civilian transfer between two submarines of two different navies in World War II.
Posted on: Fri, 23 Jan 2015 07:22:01 +0000
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