A section of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose’s family wants the Centre to set up a high-powered Special Investigation Team to look into the Netaji files declassified by the Centre and the West Bengal government and take a final call on the mysterious disappearance of the leader.
The said members of the Bose family also want the Centre to disclose the content of the files, which remain under wraps inside the coffers of the Intelligence Bureau.
Confirming that the family members had written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi about the files in January 2017, Chandra Kumar Bose, one of the signatories to the letter and himself a BJP leader said, “It is impossible to study the content of the 300-odd files disclosed by the Centre so far. It is important that the government forms a dedicated SIT to study their content. The aim should be to bring closure to the controversial disappearance of Bose on 18 August 1945.”
“There are several theories about Netaji’s disappearance… there are people who believe he died in a plane crash on that fateful day while there are others who believe he survived the crash and escaped. There are theories of Bose escaping to Russia. Some also say he may have escaped to Japan. And then there are those who believe that Bose returned to India and lived a life of anonymity until his death. The time to unearth the truth is long overdue and only an SIT studying these disclosed files can come to a conclusion. No individual researcher can do this,” said Chandra Bose and added that the family has also sought another appointment with the Prime Minister to apprise him of the gravity of the situation.
On the declassification of the IB files, Chandra Bose said that the family was unaware of the number of files yet to see the light of the day. “The IB is beyond the purview of RTI and hence we are not sure how many files remain undisclosed. The PM’s instruction was clear: to declassify all files related to Netaji, we have doubts whether or not that instruction was followed,” Bose said while drawing reference to a Calcutta High Court petition filed in this regard by an NGO.
Besides the Centre, the family also has issues with the declassified files of the Bengal government. “The Netaji files released by Mamata Banerjee do not throw much light on his disappearance. They, however, prove quite clearly that the Bose family was kept under surveillance for a long time, not only by the British Raj but also by governments of Independent India long after the leader’s disappearance,” Bose maintained.
“But there is, at least, one file which spells out how Bose family members were kept under vigilance in Orissa as well. During declassification, the state government has removed the pages of that file except for the first page for reasons best known to it. That file must also be made public,” he said.
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