Leonard A. Gordon - Brothers Against the Raj: A Biography of Indian Nationalists Sarat and Subhas Chandra Bose

BROTHERS AGAINST the RAJ

DR LEONARD A. GORDON is a professor of history at Brooklyn College, the City University of New York; associate director of the South Asia Institute, Columbia University; and director of the Taraknath Das Foundation. Dr Gordon has published several books and his Bengal: The Nationalist Movement (1876-1940) was awarded the Watumull Prize by the American Historical Association in 1974.

Praise for Brothers Against the Raj

One of the books of the year for 1990. Mainstream

Gordon has done full justice to the Bose brothers, giving them their due and recounting their story in the context of the turbulent times in which they lived.M.V. Kamath, Hindustan Times

Professor Gordon hasconducted exhaustive and painstaking research and put its fruits into an eminently readable book. Besides, he has skilfully put the story of their lives into the context of the complex politics of India and Bengal of their times.Hiranamay Karlekar, The Indian Express

The author is a New Yorker but knows Calcutta well The entire distinguished family seems to come alive as he writes, but he is careful to paint them with their warts intact.Ashin Das Gupta, The Telegraph

[An] extraordinary, informative and insightful study of Subhas and Sarat Bose.Bhabani Sen Gupta, India International Centre Quarterly

I have found the book informative and absorbing. [Gordon has] managed to combine empathy with objectivitynot an easy feat.B.R. Nanda, author of Mahatma Gandhi

Published by

Rupa Publications India Pvt. Ltd 2015

7/16, Ansari Road, Daryaganj

New Delhi 110002

Abridged edition copyright Leonard A. Gordon 2015

First published in India by Rupa Publications in 1997

The views and opinions expressed in this book are the authors own and the facts are as reported by him which have been verified to the extent possible, and the publishers are not in any way liable for the same.

All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

ISBN: 978-81-291-3663-3

Second impression 2019

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated, without the publishers prior consent, in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published.

For my sweethearts,
Evan and Wyatt, Marie and April

Contents

Preface

This edition is an abridged version of the 25-year-old original, a book that is rich and full of documentation based on more than 100 interviews and research conducted across fourteen countries. After friends advised me that it would be helpful to have a shorter book with fewer details on Indian politics and with footnotes trimmed down from the original 2,500and the publisher, Rupa agreedI agreed too. This was possible only with the able help of my friend and colleague Margaret L. King, a fine scholar and editor. She did a marvelous job with the abridgment. I only had to supply the references for quotations and omitted most of the bibliography. Those wishing to read the fully detailed life of the Boses and see the full notes and sources, should refer to the original edition.

Although quite a few books about Subhas Bose have been published in the intervening period, for the most part they have simply added details. Several fine books about Netajis years in Europe have appeared, and they are listed in the bibliography. None of these books, however, seem to have changed the story of his life as I presented it or led me to alter my analyses or judgments.

First, last, always, I would like to thank the family of Subhas and Sarat Chandra Bose for all the help they have given me for over many long years. Foremost are the late Sisir K. Bose and Krishna Bose who have assisted me in uncountable ways and shown me continuing kindness and hospitality over the years. I also must thank their children, Sugata, Sarmila, and Sumantra, who have gone out of the way innumerable times for me, and eventually became dear friends. Several of them have now written their own versions of the Boses lives, but they have never told me how to write mine. The late Charu C. Chowdhuri sat for many hours with Krishna Bose and me, trying to help me understand the early letters and views of Sarat Bose. The late Emilie Schenkl and her daughter Anita (Bose) Pfaff have shown much kindness on my visits to Vienna and Mrs Schenkl spent long hours answering my questions.

Ainslie T. Embree let me impose this work on him, year after year, chapter by chapter, and his comments have always been astute and insightful. Bharati Mukherjee helped with the critical reading of some sections, translating, and choosing of chapter titles. Dennis Dalton also read all the chapters and gave searching, detailed comments and encouragement which always buoyed me up. Johannes Voigt, Milan Hauner, Joyce Lebra, K.K. Ghosh, and Hugh Toyeall of whom have written fine accounts of Subhas Bose during the World War IIgenerously helped me to write mine and my debt to them are evident in these pages. In Calcutta, Tridib Ghose, Shipra Chatterjee, Suman Chattopadhyay, Kasturi Dutta, Piyali Guha Thakurta, Bani Nath Bose, and Bandana Mukhopadhyay helped with the collecting of materials and making translations from Bengali to English. My late, beloved aunt, Regina Berman, made translations from Italian. Other friends who read the text gave me valuable advice. As in the original edition, however, the final responsibility is, of course, my own.

My research was also facilitated by various libraries in many cities and I give my heartfelt gratitude to the staff of the India Office Library and Records, London; the British Library, London; the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi; the National Archives of India, New Delhi; the National Library of India, Calcutta; the West Bengal State Archives, Calcutta; the Netaji Research Bureau, Calcutta; the Imperial War Archives and Foreign Office Archives, Tokyo; the Foreign Office Archives, Bonn, West Germany; New York Public Library; Columbia University Library; Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.; and, the University of Chicago Library. Martin Moir and Richard Bingle at the India Office Library and the directors and staff at the Nehru Library have gone many miles to help me find what I needed.

I also want to thank members of three different generations of the Mehra family, the late Mr D. Mehra, Mr R.K. Mehra, and Mr Kapish Mehra, who have helped in many ways in encouraging me through different stages of the production and distribution of this book.

My wife, Marie, my stepdaughter, April and her husband Steve, have supported me with unfailing patience and cheerfulness. My brother Jim has helped me in many practical ways and shared in the creation of the Netaji Slide Collection and in preparing photographs for this book. I have been lucky to have him as my brother. Neither my late father, who launched me on the study of imperialism, nor my mother, who proofread an earlier book for me, are here now, but they remain with me in my heart.

Prologue: In Search of an Indian Hero

Do you love Netaji?

Mrs Sen, an elderly Bengali woman, 1976 [to the author]

Netaji passed my way (just the other day).

Major Satya Gupta, Bengal Volunteers, 1964 [to the author]

and Rumour walked blazing among them

Homer, The Iliad

I

The crowd gathered in downtown Calcutta on January 23, 1964, as they they did every year on that day to celebrate the life and triumphs of Bengals foremost nationalist leader, Subhas Chandra Bose, born on that day in 1897. Immense representations of Bose were paraded through the streets en route to the Calcutta Maidan (park). Netaji ki jai Netaji zindabad (Victory to the revered leader Subhas BoseLong live the revered leader) they shouted. It was my first winter in Calcutta where I had come to do research on Indian nationalism. Bose had been a younger leader of the Indian National Congress during the years after World War I when the movement was being guided by Mahatma Gandhi. He had worked with and also at times opposed Gandhi; and during World War II had escaped British India for Germany and then Southeast Asia, working with the enemies of the British Empire.