A RARE 1944 INTERVIEW WITH NETAJI

[Guest guest]

A new name as appeared like a meteor in the headlines of the news

papers of East Asia, that of Subhas Chandra Bose. Since his arrival

in East Asia after a mysterious trip from Germany, his fiery speeches

and confident enthusiasm have made him a celebrated personality. As

there are not many people, however, who have met him face to face, we

are now publishing a living portrait of him drawn by Wilhelm Schulze,

the East Asia correspondent of the "Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung" in

Berlin - K.M.

FROM THE MISSION NETAJI WEBSITE

http://www.missionnetaji.org/index_new.php

In my life as a journalist I have interviewed all kinds of prominent

people. Yet to this day I have a feeling of tension and uncertainty

when I am about to meet some particularly outstanding personality.

The question of what to say to such a man always disconcerts me.

 

In the case of Subhas Chandra Bose, the man who for so many years has

been fighting the British Empire with singular daring, this feeling

of uncertainty did not survive very long when I called on him a few

days ago. And as for the question of what to say to him, this did not

arise at all. I had been in his presence for less than two minutes,

and tea had hardly been served, when his ease of manner and personal

charm drove away the last vestiges of my shyness. After an hour of

animated conversation between the two of us, my feeling of

unfamiliarity had given way to complete agreement with his ideas and

sympathy with his problems, more so than is usually possible with

other people even after months of acquaintance. I admit quite openly

that Subhas Chandra Bose has won me over to his cause - lock, stock,

and barrel.

 

Subhas Chandra Bose is the Head of the Head of the Provisional

Government of Free India and Generalissimo of the Indian National

Army of Liberation. To capture him must be the dream of every British

Secret Service agent. Subhas Chandra Bose has offered the members of

this organization plenty of opportunity since his fight from India to

Germany and his adventurous journey to Japan; but the British always

missed the bus. In Tokyo, where he was staying as an observer of the

Congress of the Independent Nations of Greater East Asia and was, no

doubt, the most sensational personality present, a single Japanese

policeman stationed at the gate of the beautiful villa housing him

and his small stuff was enough to guarantee his security.

 

But, even without the policeman at the gate, it would probably be no

easy matter to capture him; for, sitting in the comfortable armchair

before me, Subhas Chandra Bose was the personification of physical

strength and mental vitality. His broad figure, stocky rather than

tall, radiates health. He was wearing a well cut uniform of the

Indian Army of Liberation, distinguished from that of a private only

by two small discs on the right breast. His movements are vigorous

but controlled, and one can tell that they are only indications of

what they can be if necessity arises. His clean shaven, almost light-

skinned face and spectacled eyes radiate an energy and intensity of

life which make it seem advisable to start a quarrel with him. In

contrast to his enemies and opponents in India, the impression he

gives is one of untouched reserves of latent power. When his chief

aide-de-camp Hassan comes in to ask him something and addresses him

as 'Netaji', which means leader, I must admit that Bose merits this

title if only for his tremendous vitality. He is the exact opposite

of all we imagine an Indian to be in the way of passivity, tolerance,

and uncomplaining acceptance of the sufferings dealt out by a hostile

face.

 

In the last few months he has proved that he may lay justified claim

to the title of Netaji by having created a disciplined, powerful

organization out of the chaos in which he found the Indian movement

in East Asia on his arrival. He has demonstrated his talent for

leadership in dozens of negotiations with the statesmen out here,

from Prime Minister Tojo to Dr.Ba Maw, the Burmese chief of state. It

stands to reason that these men would not have chosen him as an ally

and co-fighter on a decisive front if they were not convinced of is

ability and carried away by his enthusiasm. And finally he proved

himself a leader at the Congress of Nations as well as in the many

interviews which e granted to the press and which made great demands

upon his presence of mind.

 

He was still somewhat inclined to be the leader when, after the first

few exchanges of courtesies and compliments, we turned to the sober

facts and his struggle. It was he who put the questions at first, for

he whished to quench his thirst for knowledge of the situation in

Europe, of political developments in Germany, his first place of

exile; and this thirst for knowledge reveals his desire not to over

look events in the outer world in his preoccupation over his own

affairs. Then only could we approach his own theme: India His

inquisitive eyes grew soft when finally he began to speak about India

and her troubles, about his own plans and intensions, about the

difficulties facing him and their undeniably approaching solution,

and about the coming victory of free, independent India

Bose has one firm, unshakeable conception of the events of the future

which he repeats in all his interviews and all his speeches: India's

independence can only be real independence if it is gained by her own

sacrifices. Only an independence that has been paid for by the

Indians with their own blood can be defended in the time of need, and

Bose rejects any other independence for India. He has sometimes been

reproached for this firm attitude, and it has been said that he was

bloodthirsty. Indeed, many of his utterances seem to justify this

reproach, and it is true that he never forgets to mention the

necessity of sacrifice in lives.

 

In this conversation he surprised me by not speaking of his

determination to make such sacrifices but, on the contrary, by

emphasizing the more unwarlike sides of his struggle for his country.

Knowing his subject, India, by heart as he does, and never having

recourse to notes in his public speeches, he preferred on this

occasion to discuss the political aspects of his campaign, and with

them the idea of India from the cultural point of view. Perhaps I was

partly responsible for this by remarking that he was to be envied for

the satisfaction of knowing that he had done all that was possible

for the conquest of India, but that I did not envy him the probably

much more difficult task of one day having to unite the 380 million

Indians with their different languages, religions, castes, and

classes and to weld them into one nation.

 

"That will not be nearly as hard as you may perhaps think at the

moment" Bose replied softly. He always speaks softly in a deep voice,

and his English is some times slightly guttural. "But I see that you

have been reading English literature on India, and your ideas

correspond to what the English like to spread everywhere. Let me tell

you that neither religions nor castes, neither the maharajas nor

the 'depressed classes' invented during the last few years by the

English, the 'untouchables', offer serious problems in the way of

Indian unity. And even less the differences in languages.

 

Then I was given a little lecture on Indian history, which rapidly

led from the earliest origins via the mutiny of 1857, the first

organized Indian revolt against England, to the recent past and

present. The maharajas? It stands to reason that, as the

beneficiaries of the British rule, they are without exception opposed

to the Indian struggle for freedom. But the unarmed population will

drive them out with sticks and scythes as soon as the British have

been beaten; for England's friendship has not extended so far as to

permit the maharajas to have their own troops. The conflict between

Hindus and Moslems? It has only existed for a few decades, having

been invented by the British Viceroy Lord Minto and taken up and

furthered by Mohammedan dignitaries for selfish reasons. But the

Congress Party has more Moslem members than Moslem League. And

finally, the depressed classes? They were not discovered by the

English until the later found that even religious disputes were no

longer enough to sustain their policy of "divide and rule." They are

by no means a political problem but a purely social one which,

however, must be dealt with far and more thoroughly than the British

have ever pretended to do.

 

"The English have seen to it," Bose then continued, "that the world

forgot that India has actually always formed a cultural unit in their

history, although not always a political one. In spite of all

differences in language, an Indian from North will find all he needs

for his private and religious life every where in the South. In our

prayers for our country we include by the name all the holy places of

India from one end to the other. In former days the numerous founders

of philosophical schools in India, who benefited by the proverbial

Indian tolerance and provided the outer world with a constant stream

of new thought, had, if they wished to obtain recognition for their

doctrines, to travel form one holy place to another to debate with

the representatives of the existing schools before they could say

that they had won India over. This feeling of all India's unity is

something the English have never been able to take from us, no matter

how many allies they brought and used from Indian ranks. The very

fact that at present the innermost British circles are planning and

preparing to split up India after the war into four or five

completely separate countries shows more clearly than anything else

that all their other measures for the destruction of Indian unity

have failed. No, indeed, not for a moment am I anxious about Indian

unity after the war has been won against the English."

 

Bose waxed so enthusiastic over his theme that he even let his

cigarette go out. Lost in thought, he took another out of the box

beside him, pulled out his lighter, lit it and, without having lit

the new cigarette, went on speaking. He hardly noticed that I finally

gave him a light and blew out his own lighter. It was not until a few

seconds later, in the midst of a sentence, that he thanked me. But

soon that cigarette went out too, and neither of us bothered about

lighting the third.

 

"It was a really fine gesture but at the same time it is an

auspicious deed," he continued, "that at the Congress of the

Independent Nations of Greater East Asia Premier Tojo promised to

hand over the Andaman and Nicobar Islands to the Provisional

Government of Free India. A fine gesture because everyone in India

knows the Andaman Islands to be the compulsory home of political

exiles, as the Indian counterpart to Siberia, and as the penal

settlement for the Indian fighters for Independence. That these very

islands should become the first bid of Free India, that on them the

Indian flag should for the first time fly over the free Indian soil,

is almost symbolic. The association of ideas from the prison to the

home of Indian liberty is inevitable. It will have incalculable

effect with in India.

 

"And the handing over the islands to the Provisional Government is an

auspicious deed because the British have already given out their

propaganda that India will never get back these islands unless Japan

were beaten and defeated. The islands are ancient Indian possessions,

and this propaganda, may have had some effect, especially since it

was occupied with the claim that the Japanese would establish bases

there from which they could dominate the Indian Ocean. Tojo's promise

has knocked the bottom out of this propaganda. The entire trend of

the future Japanese policy toward Free India is already contained in

this promise; and no one should be surprised if we have more

confidence than ever in the Japanese policy, if an increase in

confidence was possible."

 

After this climax, our conversation turned to other affairs. In a few

strokes the Netaji outlined the personality of Gandhi who, he said,

would in the last few years of his life probably not abandon his

principal of rejecting force but would more likely retire into

background. He spoke about Nehru, who by no means d to the

principle of passive resistance but only regarded it as a temporary

means to an end, until a better means had been found. Peoples and

names passed in review, and in every case one could feel that they

were registered in Bose's brain as if in a well kept card index, with

all their qualities and weaknesses. Finally, Bose professed himself

and his followers to be supporters of the Congress Party, although

they had meanwhile formed the Forward Bloc within the Congress Party

and were in part opposed by the official leaders before the out break

of the war.

 

"But all this is past history," he concluded in a firm, conciliatory

tone. "We can and will take up the threads, but the past must not

hinder us in our progress, and it will not hinder us. You can rely on

that."

 

His chief aide-de-camp Hassan - who with his pointed black beard

looks deceptively like a maharaja in the movies but who can make good

jokes in fluent German and keeps a close watch on the Netaji's time

table - had meanwhile discreetly indicated for the third time that it

was necessary to conclude our chat and had left the room for the

third time without success. My host even offered me a whisky. When I

lifted my glass to drink to his campaign, Bose thanked me and said:

 

"Please do not forget to send my regards to Germany. I think back

with pleasure and gratitude to the time I was allowed to spend in

Germany during the war and to the great sympathy and support given to

me by the German Government and the German people in our struggle for

independence. We are determined to fight to the end with the Axis

powers and their allies, no matter what sacrifices it may cost, as

long as final victory is won."

 

Broad-shouldered and self-confident he stood there before me as he

said this, and he shook my hand firmly as I took leave. "Good luck,"

I said on giving out, and "Au revoir in Free India," replied the

Netaji with a friendly smile.

 

Source: The XXth Century-Russian Collection- Hamilton Library,

University of

Hawaii, Volume VI, page 15-18, January, 1944.

http://www.missionnetaji.org/page/interview_with_netaji.html

NEW DELHI: Four young media professionals have launched a website

dedicated to one of India's longest running political controversies -

Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose's 'mysterious' disappearance 60 years ago.

 

Launched last week, http://www.missionnetaji.org is a "treat for the

mystery buff as well as for those who refuse to believe in his

reported death in an alleged plane crash on Aug 18, 1945, in Taipei",

said Anuj Dhar, one of the four media professionals behind the idea.

 

The website comes at a time when the nation is eagerly awaiting the

report of the Justice Manoj Kumar Mukherjee Commission of Inquiry

(probing the disappearance of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose in August

1945) to be tabled in parliament later this month.

 

"All that we have put online till now does make interesting reading.

And it would be shocking if some of it turns out to be true when the

report of the commission is made public," Dhar said.

 

"Most of the write-ups on the site hit out at the government,

including the Prime Minister's Office, for alleged attempts to run

down 'India's biggest cover-up'."

 

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1442642.cms