Throughout the 17 years of Nehru's and the years of his daughter and grandson the Dynasty did not allow the contribution of Netaji to the Freedom Struggle to occupy its rightful place and after the Left took charge of the Ministry of Education after the split in the Congress in 1969, which saw Syed Nurul Hassan being crowned as the Czar of Higher Education, Netaji's stature in Indian History was deliberately slighted. One has only to read the badly crafted sentences in Bipan Chandra's Struggle for Freedom to realize the pathetic depths to which the leftist historians would go to diminish the stature of this towering figure. Throughout those long years Professor Samar Gupta kept raising questions about the disappearance of Netaji but little was done about honouring his memory. It was left to Hon ble Narendra Modi to build a suitable Museum to house the relics of the Indian National Army in New Delhi.
Why was the Nehruvian State hostile to Netaji? This questions goes right to the elephant lurking in the room. How did India get its Freedom. Dynasty friendly historians have chosen to silence the contribution of the INA and treat it as a mere embarrassing interlude in a Glorious Chapter headed by the great Troika--Gandhi, Nehru and Patel. Savarkar was brushed aside as the man who wrote "mercy petitions" thereby undermining his many years of sacrifice and suffering. Bose was made to "disappear" literally and metaphorically and so his legacy remained alien to Indian political life. The Forward Bloc founded by Bose tried to carry the torch but after the advent of the Communist Party of India, the Marxist Faction to prominence under Jyoti Basu swerved leftward leaving Bose behind.
In 1991 when P V Narashima Rao was the Prime Minister and was running a minority Government with a deft combination of inducement (bribes JMM Bribery Case) and state coercion (the Jain Diary Case), a decision was made to award the Bharat Ratna to Subash Chandra Bose. He was tagged with Abdul Kalam Azad whose standing in India was certainly not of the same stature as Netaji Bose. A shrewd political gambit to link Bose with Azad hoping that it could be sold as "secular" recognition of two outstanding individuals.
On October 10 1991 the Prime Minister wrote to R Venkataraman, the then President requesting the investiture of the Bharat Ratna on the two individuals, Bose and Azad, in recognition for "public service of the highest order" and "outstanding contribution to the freedom struggle". As far as the dynasty friendly historians were concerned, Bose ceased to struggle for Freedom once he was expelled from the Congress and as I have shown earlier the INA was reduced to an embarrassing footnote. So what exactly was being honoured in 1991--the Bose of the Congress Days or the great Netaji of the INA.
On 3th February 1992, A K Narayanan, Joint Secretary Ministry of Home Affairs wrote to K N Bakshi the Indian Ambassador to Austria to contact Mrs Emilie Schenkl the widow of Netaji and Dr Mrs Anita Pfaff the daughter of the Great Patriot. On Feb 21 1992 Dr Anita Pfaff wrote to the Ambassador:
"We are aware, however, the fact that in the past Netaji's achievements and contributions have not been recognized, particularly when it could be avoided comfortably". She went on to say that "Such an honour would have been appropriate in the 1950s."
A stinging rebuke from the daughter of the Patriot. And she went on to say "Whether his achievements were so minor that he had to stand in line for so long or so great that they would be remembered even after such a long time". Obviously the Bharat Ratna to Subash Bose who is a legend in India puts him at par with Nehru, Indira Gandhi Rajiv Gandhi and scores more and hence no patriot of India will ever like to see the legend diminished in this way. She concluded by saying that "One cannot honour Netaji today by awarding the Bharat Ratna.
The Bose Family did not accept the award and the insignia and Sanad as per the procedure are now in the Ministry of Home Affais.
stinging
