India's biggest cover-up

by Anuj Dhar

  Researchers are increasingly convinced that the whole Bose mystery would be solved once and for all if the INA funds, believed to be running into crores, are traced. [21]

  One of the researchers, Subharnshu Roy claimed before the Mukherjee Commission that his correspondence with former CSDIC officer Hugh Toye “proved the INA treasure were handed over to Nehru in November 1945”. [22] A similar charge was made by INA’s Lakshmi Seghal in Amritsar in 2002.

  #6: Netaji was seen next to Panditji’s bier in 1964

  No other snippet of the Bose mystery has traversed generational gaps like the theory that “Subhas Bose” had turned up to pay respects to departed Jawaharlal Nehru in New Delhi’s Teen Murti Bhavan in May 1964. Its proof lies in the picture you have just seen.

  But the Bose lookalike monk was not him for simple reason that he was Vira Dhammavara—a venerable Cambodian Buddhist monk who lived in south Delhi for decades before passing away in the US only a couple of years back at the grand old age of 110. Dhammavara’s inadvertent doppelganger act lasted barely for a second or two on camera, but it triggered a sensation so strong that it caused commotion in India for several years. The monk was quite amused about it and he actually deposed before the Khosla Commission in person to clear the air. [23]

  Dr Lokesh Chandra, an eminent art historian of our times, also appeared before the commission to testify that he had known Dhammavara ever since he was a child and the Buddhist monk was indeed “present by the side of the dead body of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru”. [24]

  His likeness to Bose from a certain angle notwithstanding, Dhammavara was actually a short man. Bose, as per his family members, was close to 5ft 10in tall. Take a closer look at another still:

  And if you are still not convinced, check out this montage. The two pictures on right were taken at different times from the first three and yet we can see it is Dhammavara in all.

  #7: Netaji was behind an abortive coup attempt

  This is the least known but perhaps the most explosive of all the conspiracy theories relating to the Bose mystery. But what would you say to such an obnoxious idea when the very word “coup” has been unthinkable in India? “Anyone who harbours it should get his head checked.” Precisely for this reason, I dismissed the theory with a derisive laughter when I first heard it.

  But today as I see some pieces of scattered information, I am not sure if this is a laughing matter.

  As former Intelligence Bureau Director BN Mullik was being examined before the Khosla Commission in 1972, Forward Bloc counsel Amar Prasad Chakravarty suddenly changed tack and asked him: “Can you tell me one thing? At any stage were you afraid that there would be a coup in India?”

  Mullik should have given an emphatic “no” for an answer, but instead he responded strangely.

  “I do not think this concerns here,” he told GD Khosla. “For this information I would claim privilege and I would like to get a clearance from the Government.”

  “But it is already out. This is published in India-China war by Maxwell,” Chakravarty said. He was referring to a book written by former London Times correspondent Neville Maxwell. The book had become controversial for its “anti-India” stance and the claim that it was based on classified Henderson Brookes inquiry report into the 1962 war.

  “What Maxwell had told is a pack of lies,” Mullik said.

  “But do you remember and did this Government suspect behind this coup any person or persons and regarding that is there any report?”

  “No inquiry was ever referred to me about any alleged coup in India.”

  “But you were trying places for Panditji for his hide-out.”

  “What Maxwell has said in his book is a pack of lies.”

  “You say it is incorrect?”

  “It is incorrect.”

  “And General Chaudhury was chastised, do you remember?”

  “He was not chastised in my presence.”

  “And on your report, you and Biju Patnaik were entrusted...”

  “That is all false. What Maxwell has mentioned in his book is absolutely false from A to Z.”

  “Why are you not proceeding against Maxwell then?”

  At this point, Justice Khosla interrupted. What he said would take your breath away.

  “Let us confine to Netaji, and not go beyond that. If Netaji was behind this coup, you can ask him.”

  “I am asking him whether he made an inquiry?” said Chakravarty.

  “He said that no inquiry was entrusted to him. You can ask him whether he knew Netaji was behind that coup,” Khosla emphasised.

  “Let him say,” Chakravarty replied.

  “Supposing hypothetically it is true, so far as Netaji is concerned, it throws no light,” Khosla reasoned.

  Chakravarty was not giving it up. He further asked Mullik:

  “And if I say you were specially instructed to see whether there is any link in the military with the Netaji and also with the other top officials in the Government?”

  “Never.”

  “And that is why Pandit Nehru entrusted you for a hide-out for his safety?"

  “No.”

  “And you also entrusted Biju Patnaik to set up some organisation for a counter-coup. Is it not so?”

  “How can I ask Biju Patnaik to do it?”

  “True, because you were the only man of confidence of Pandit Nehru, at that time.”

  “This is completely incorrect.”

  “And would it be correct, what you have written in your book that you were also the man who changed decisions with Pandit Nehru?”

  “I have never said this.”

  “What is the relevance it has with regard to Netaji?” Khosla asked Chakravarty.

  “Well, my Lord, there is the whole background behind it.” [25]

  There are no further elaborations in the Khosla proceeding records, but when I met Amar Prasad Chakravarty’s assistant Sunil Krishna Gupta, he told me that there were rumours of an abortive coup bid after the 1962 war. Since Gupta was also the person feeding information relating to Khosla’s sham inquiry to Bhagwanji, I asked him whether the holy man also talked anything like that. Gupta did not give me a clear answer. Several of the questions that Chakravarty, died in 1985, put to several witnesses were evidently inspired by what the holy man said. For example, he asked BN Mullik if the IB had ever tried to find out who was General Siva referred in Lowell Thomas’s book The Dalai Lama.

  Around the same time I met Gupta, an anonymous person made a most astonishing claim to me, linking a most devastating tragedy in the Indian armed forces to this conspiracy theory. “Some people wanted Netaji back and they paid the price”. I dwelt a little into it and found nothing which could have helped in making any such deduction. All I learnt that the mishap referred to had some lose ends.

  On 22 November 1963 a small Alouette helicopter went down in Gulpur, Jammu and Kashmir. With it was lost virtually the entire top brass of Western Command, the biggest command of the Indian Army, and also the chief of Western Air Command. In all, two lieutenant-generals, one air vice marshal, one major general, one brigadier and one bright young flight lieutenant were lost. “This was no ordinary list of casualties. Not even in an action on the battlefield have so many officers of such high rank been killed at one stroke in recent history.” [26] The highest ranking officer to be martyred in the 1971 war would be a brigadier.

  Lt Gen Daulet Singh, GOC-in-C, Western Command, the third senior officer of the Indian Army, was tipped to be next Deputy Chief of Army Staff. His immensely popular corps commander, Lt Gen Bikram Singh, whose statue in Jammu is a landmark of the city, was also due for promotion. Their brilliant service record was matched by that of another victim and hero of 1961 Goa operation Air Vice Marshal Eric William Pinto. Maj Gen NKD Nanavati, formerly the Military Attaché in the Embassy of India in Moscow, had just been promoted and so was Brig SR Uberoi. Both had been decorated with Mahavair Chakras. Pilot Fl Lt SS Sodhi was recently awarded the Vayu Sena Medal for his meritoriou
s services in the sector. [Daulet, Bikram, Nanavati and Uberoi seen in the combo image]

  The tragedy obviously left New Delhi numbed. The blow at home was followed by another from abroad. Pro-India John F Kennedy was assassinated the same day. On 23 November 1963 the newspapers covered both the stories prominently.

  The Times of India mentioned in bold on page one that the “Government circles in Delhi were naturally puzzled tonight how the five top officers happened to travel together in one helicopter on an inspection tour of a sensitive frontier area”. [27] The rumours of “sabotage” began doing rounds as soon as the mishap occurred. It was reported in a Hindu story that “something inside the helicopter exploded”. [28] On November 24, Prime Minister Nehru tried to scotch them. “There is no reason to think that it has been an act of sabotage…I cannot say definitely, but we should not make charges without some justification,” he told Congress MPs in Delhi. “It appears that the helicopter got tied up with some telegraph wires—I do not know the details. There is no reason why it should get tied up when it is flying low or fast. But there it was.” [29]

  The PM’ statement led to an uproar in Parliament. “On what basis did the Prime Minister say that he thought it was not a case of sabotage? Did he get any report from any quarter because all the occupants of this helicopter were killed,” asked Bupesh Gupta in the Rajya Sabha. “Don’t you think it is serious? Can you show a precedent where within a matter of hours since the accident took place, without relying on anything, but merely on a surmise a statement of this nature is made?” Gupta was joined by Atal Bihari Vajpayee:

  When the statement was made by the Defence Minister, he should have given the information that there was no possibility of sabotage. But the statement was silent and then the Prime Minister went to the Congress parliamentary party’s meeting and said it as if the party had a higher status than this august House. …When an inquiry is being conducted, how can he (Nehru) say with certainty that there was no sabotage…? [30]

  In the Lok Sabha, where the PM was present, NG Ranga asked, "When Government do not know all facts, how is it that the Prime Minister ventured to suggest that there could be no sabotage?” “This is for the House to decide,” Nehru went on the defensive. “Where was the need to offer an opinion?” Ranga wondered. He was joined by Krishnpal Singh. “I would like to know on what evidence he bases his observation. Since there were no survivors how does he come to know that the helicopter met with an accident on account of the telegraph wires?” [31]

  As the official version went, the chopper had rammed into a wire suspended across a small gorge. It appeared to be a case of pilot error. But newspaper reports suggested that Sondhi knew the terrain well. Defence Minister YB Chavan himself admitted in the Lok Sabha that he “had taken the ‘recce’ only two days before the accident took place”. [32]

  I happened to meet the grandchildren of two of the deceased officers and found them to be living with the family view that there was more to the mishap than what had been given out by the Government. One made clear that his grandfather was annoyed with the Government over its handling of the 1962 war.

  I personally think that it is something of a smoking gun that just before he got into the helicopter, Gen Bikram Singh should have signed the local battalion visitor's register "again with a sigh and the ominous words: 'I hope this is not my last signature'". [33] I came across this in a book authored by a former army officer who termed the general's remark as a "premonition" of his death. People endowed with scientific temperament should not explain things with such superstitious analogies. A logical explanation would be that General Singh had some reason to fear for his life.

  The Gulpur crash has also been detailed by former Home Secretary RD Pradhan in his book, but since he has not quoted official records, especially the report of inquiry constituted after the crash, not all questions have been answered. I am sure the release of records—including those with the Intelligence Bureau—will rest the doubts. Such as, how the bodies of the victims were sliced and badly mutilated even though the chopper had come down from a height of 150 feet.

  The core argument in favour of declassifying the official records is that their release sets the record straight.

  VI. The men who kept the secrets

  Except for a small portrait in his study, there was nothing in the old man’s house in one affluent part of New Delhi to suggest that he had anything to do with Subhas Chandra Bose. From his aquiline features, Pradip Bose did not remind one of his uncle. Actually he wouldn’t even talk about him unless he was asked to. Pradip and his British wife spent their summers in London and winters in India. This unassuming son of Suresh Bose spoke softly but thought strongly about the issue of his uncle’s fate, just as most of his kin still do.

  Pradip was in flashback mode while talking to me years back: “For 47 years I kept asking my late brother Aurobindo—‘please tell me of your part in his escape from Calcutta in 1941?’—but he wouldn’t say anything more than what was known publicly.” Then he commented: “Isn’t that strange? Even governments declassify secrets after 30 years?!”

  It took me a long time to grasp the true import of Pradip’s parable.

  Before he escaped from India, Subhas had placed his nephews Aurobindo and Dwijendranath Bose “under oath of secrecy” to not to reveal under any circumstance anything more than what they were instructed to. Aurobindo’s part—as reported in the Indian Express of 28 January 1941—was to provide a false lead that Bose was in Kolkata on 25 January 1941, when he had actually left days earlier.

  This pattern of escape, Pradip Bose said, was also evident in the Bose’s “planned escape” to the Soviet Union in 1945.

  At least seven members of the Bose family knew about some aspects of his escape from India. But Subhas came to the conclusion that if all of them pretended they did not know anything about his escape then at least some of them would be arrested, interrogated and even tortured to get at the truth. To avoid such a possibility he constructed a story of his withdrawal from worldly affairs in order to meditate in an undisturbed environment. He withdrew behind a curtain and only one person, his nephew Aurobindo, was allowed to enter into the 'prohibited area' late in the evening to know about his requirements.

  While Aurobindo knew that Subhas had left Calcutta on 17th January, 1941, he told the police that he had seen Netaji on 25th January, as Subhas had asked him to do. On the 26th January an announcement was made that he was no longer in his room. Aurobindo was a 'viable witness' swearing that he saw Subhas Bose on the 25th night, while actually he had already crossed the Indo-Afghan border. [1]

  The British tortured Aurobindo’s cousin Dwijendra in the Lahore Fort and got nothing out of him. More than thirty years later, Aurobindo and Dwijendra appeared before the Khosla Commission with nothing changed. Aurobindo admitted that he and Dwijen “were confidants of Netaji and both of them were under oath of secrecy” to him and spoke of his disbelief in their uncle’s death in Taiwan. Dwijen was more forthcoming of the two. He admitted that the oath had bound him to secrecy. But repeated queries failed to get anything more out of him.

  “From what period to what period you were in jail?”

  “From April 1941 to September 1945.”

  “May I take it that you were taken into confidence along with other two cousins, that is Aurobindo Bose, Sisir Bose and sister Ila in the matter of his disappearance from India?”

  “Yes.”

  “In 1941?”

  “Yes.”

  “Could you tell us briefly about Netaji’s early life? One aspect is about his secretive nature.”

  “I cannot give you the entire story of his departure because I am under an oath to Netaji. Unless I am asked by Netaji, I cannot do that.”

  "I am not on that at all. In order to supplement the view that you have taken about Netaji's secretive nature….”

  “He did not consult anybody. He went to Jaipur, served the cholera patients and came back. When he was studying in the Presid
ency College, he left home in quest of a guru. At home also he did not consult his own mother who was living in the next room. My father was alive, he was eldest to him. He used to meet Netaji daily. He was not informed also.”

  “When he had completely made up his mind, you were taken into confidence!?”

  “That I do not know. But I was taken into confidence when he needed.”

  “And that was the penultimate stage?”

  “That I cannot say because I am not in a position to say. I am under oath.” [2]

  Pradip Bose told me that he saw a pattern in his brother’s behaviour and that of Habibur Rahman’s.

  At least five or six persons in the provisional Government of Azad Hind knew that Netaji was planning to escape to the Soviet Union after the end of the war but only one person Habibur Rahman was chosen to fly with him. He was the sole Indian witness to the event of his death. Or, was it yet another non-event, as vouched for by Aurobindo on an earlier occasion? [3]

  Pradip’s elder sister agreed. Shiela Sengupta actually took me back to a dramatic happening in the year 1946 when Habibur Rahman had come over to Calcutta. Bose’s maternal uncle Satyen Dutt broached up the issue of his death and Rahman recounted for the umpteenth time what had happened in Taipei.

  “See!” he stretched out his hands. “I got these burns trying to save him.” Satyen Dutt, a doctor, took a closer look. Hideous burn marks on the dorsal and upper arms. “Habib!” he queried, “How did your palms escape severe burning?” “You just said you tore off burning clothes with your bare hands!”