STATEMENT OFF THE SOUL ... 9

1. Death strikes at the door every moment and we are impervious to its demands. It is renunciation that takes cognisance of it and prepares to vanquish it. The rest of humanity sleeps in the senses and inevitably succumbs to the charms of life and its deathly counterpart.

2. The night shrouds the designs of the diabolical; the day reveals the shine of the Self, dispelling delusions, manifesting the light within.

3. When the nation is faced with threats dire, it is time to stand together in rank and in file to face the challenge. When peace reigns thereafter, it is meet that each of us devotes himself to self-development for the strengthening of the nation.

4. The democrat and the liberal often fail to achieve the high goals of civilisation in a world vitiated by greed, power-drunkenness and violence. The dictator, narrow in his designs and focused in his ulterior motivations, achieves within a short span what it takes liberalism much longer to attain. But the fruits of tyranny are short-lived and decay sets in the race that subscribes to absolutist reign for long. Contrarily, democracy for all its obvious faults is more enduring in its benefits and is a boon unto humanity. Civilisation is the march of humanity unto the destination of freedom and democracy with its diverse checks and balances seems the very way to achieve it.

5. When the winds of change blow, the existing order gives way to an altered circumstance in which old links are severed and fresh ones forged. The world then takes on to a new flight along an altered trajectory to pursue an ideal thus far suppressed but never obliterated quite, for it is in the very nature of evolution to ascend the peaks of fulfilment along a mountainous detour. Thus, proceeds the march of civilisation and thus advances man.

6. Let truth prevail free of fear, fancy, fantasy or fiction founded in facile imagination. May reason temper emotion and probability balance possibility! The nation needs to know the truth about Netaji, every aspect of his much-debated life, every shred that is shrouded in mystery. And the only way to go about it is to practise what Gorbachev had dubbed 'glasnost' (openness), in matters related to Netaji. Let the Governments of the world be made to release the classified files on Netaji and may individuals privy to vital information about the hero bring to light the same as well. Only through such openness can 'perestroika' (reconstruction) of our benighted nation be possible, for in the knowledge of our nation's true history we will be in line to link ourselves to our heritage in the rightful way and so become empowered to fulfil her future mission.

7. We have been blessed with a veritable galaxy of great men and women who we, at this distance in time from their mutual historical differences, ought to celebrate knowing full well that rare indeed is a nation so endowed by Providence with such a plethora of talent and genius and the supreme spirit of service and sacrifice, call it what you will.

8. Do activists determine from now on what we are going to post on Netaji on our facebook pages? Are they to be the sole arbiters in this matter? Is our freedom hostage to their whims from now on? In a democracy freedom of expression within reasonable bounds is a sine qua non and curtailment of adequate freedom is, therefore, contrary to the spirit of the Constitution of the land we inhabit. The threat to democratic discourse on Netaji is, therefore, a matter for serious cogitation and ought to engage our best minds on the decadent trend to demonise so-called adversaries to certain set beliefs held by fanatical followers of our supreme patriot. I earnestly wonder what our leader (Netaji) would have to say on this issue were it possible, hypothetically speaking, to elicit his views on the retrograde trends of recent times which have disgraced democracy yet again in this motherland of ours famed for civilised discourse.

9. If you are free of egotism, you are free indeed for nothing binds more than this false sense of self-importance, nothing causes greater restlessness and lack of spontaneous joy than this false sense of sense-identification.

10. As I burn my midnight oil, I wonder, who did Netaji in? There was so much treachery. Oh, how did he bear it all?

STATEMENT OFF THE SOUL ... 8

1. When millions rise up in rebellion for the establishment of the truth of the freedom movement, then the government of the day will scarce have the temerity to hold in its shelves documents that pertain to essential fact and will bow before popular sovereignty to disclose the truth. Such a gigantic movement we must build up to do justice to our heroes who bled and made the British bleed to free our nation.

2. A nation of nincompoops can scarce appreciate genuine martial valour as exemplified by Netaji and the INA in freeing the nation form the bondage of the barbarous British. It will require stronger blood in the future to assimilate their glorious deeds on the battlefields of Burma and Manipur before this nation awakes to its true heritage, the legacy it has inherited from the blood spilled off its martyrs' veins and the deaths of its revolutionaries from British bullets and at the scaffold.

3. Our women must be the embodiment of purity even as they advance in learning and culture for it is they who are the womb of future India. Unto them is bequeathed the responsibility of mothering future glorious India and unto them I bring forth my prostrations for they are the emblems of the Mother Divine.

4. Service to sentience, beholding living beings as incarnations of the Divine, is Ramakrishna's Seva Yoga.

5. History unfolds as per the resolution of the forces operative in the world consequent on past human action, present imperatives and future aspirations battling against the forces of Nature within the confines of which and in conflict against which the historical narrative rolls out.

6. In the absence of love where are we headed? Is nation-building possible without love for the nation and is love for the nation possible without basic renunciation of the carnal appetites? Love subsists in spirituality and service flows off it.

7. When the senses have been subdued, man works at ease without attachment to material cravings, and then alone is work rendered divine, then alone is work worthwhile and of fullest fruition.

8. How can a nation accept the horrendous lies abounding its greatest hero of the freedom struggle without even bothering to find out the facts through reading, research and investigation into the actual events centring his life and activities? Call we ourselves a virtuous people? No, we are not. We are a nation of debilitated fools fed on fantasy and fiction on all sides. We ought to be ashamed of ourselves and it is high time to turn on a new leaf and change the course of our national vessel towards the polarity of truth. Have we courage or character to do that? I leave it unto you, my sisters, my brothers, to ponder and decide for yourselves. Then act if you can muster strength enough to alter the narrative of our national history from what it through fabrication is to what in truth it ought to have been. Citizens, unto you belongs the stage for this historical course-correction. Act now, else, we perish as a race.

9. The atomic explosions by USA on Japan entail incalculable karmic consequences on the former to sure visit them in the fullness of time. Is there any hope for humanity in this deluded age when the mad race for power seemingly is the aspired end of nation states that can only annihilate the human species for good? Whither wisdom, whither common sense, whither morality, whither enlightenment? All seems dark. Will the man of power now overhaul the system and make technology his slave instead of the other way round? One waits in expectancy to see the man of peace lend his light to the men in power and bring this transformation about.

10. We are no more a martial race; disobedience runs in our veins. The kshatriya valour is lost to most of us and with it subservience to authority. Slaves we are and as slaves we behave, each one trying to dictate over the other by means crooked and corrupt. No wonder Swamiji had emphasised the rebuilding of the virtue of martial obedience in us as a race and Netaji had stressed the necessity of a Congress dictatorship for twenty years on gaining of independence so as to rationalise the race in observance of freedom and its due maintenance. Netaji's statement in this relation must be seen in this light and not unduly distorted to suit malefic ends of maligning him.

BABA ALLAUDDIN GHARANA

The gharana founded by Ustad Allauddin Khan is, in the words of his son and disciple Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, called Baba Allauddin Gharana. People variously call it also the Maihar Gharana and the Maihar-Seniya Gharana. But Ustad Ali Akbar Khan has set the seal on it by saying that it is called Baba Allauddin Gharana.

Baba Allauddin Khan had several music Gurus but the most famous was Ustad Wazir Khan of Rampur who was the last descendent of Mian Taan Sen who carried the musical flame of the Seniya Gharana and kept it alive. Allauddin Khan in effect inherited from his great Guru Wazir Khan the best musical tradition of the Seniya Gharana and perpetuated it through his continuing line of disciples like Pandit Ravi Shankar, Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, Pandit Ajay Sinha Roy, Pandit Nikhil Banerjee, Pandit Pannalal Ghosh, Ustad Bahadur Khan, Ustad Ashish Khan, Ustad Dhyanesh Khan, Pandit V.G.Jog, Vidushi Sharan Rani and a host of others who have carried the music of the gharana to the remotest corners of the globe.

But the one disciple that stood out singularly among this galaxy of musical maestros and who most closely resembled Baba Allauddin in terms of temperament, austerity and whole-soul dedication to music was the one about whom Baba himself was effusive in praise as follows: "She plays the surbahar like Devi Saraswati." She was Annapurna Devi, the truest inheritor of Baba Allauddin's life and legacy, one who has spent the major part of her life within the cloister of her apartment, in self-exile from the world in solitary immersion in the ocean of music as she has inherited from her father.

Annapurna Devi is veritably a goddess who has shunned name, fame and the paraphernalia and devoted herself to the pursuit of music, pristine, pure. She has also, like her father, left behind a galaxy of musical talent among which is the famous flautist Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia. Another noteworthy name is that of flautist Nityanand Haldipur.

The Seniya Gharana perhaps would have died a natural death after the demise of its last exponent Ustad Wazir Khan but for the musical genius of the young Allauddin. The tradition continues as Baba Allauddin Gharana keeps flourishing with every passing year. But would Baba have been happy with the decline in sadhana and the growing cult of self-proclaimed Pandits wielding the instruments Baba venerated to further their selfish ends of life and livelihood, men masquerading as musicians whom Baba would not have given any credence to as artistes worth the call? I wonder.

My prostrations at Baba's feet and at the feet of Ramakrishna Paramahamsadev who had blessed Baba at Star Theatre when Baba was employed there as tabla-player by Girish Chandra Ghosh. Who knows, may be Thakur's blessings opened up the springs of musical genius within Baba for good? I wonder.

STATEMENT OFF THE SOUL ... 7

1. The ideal is bigger than the personality; hence, the hankering of followers to deify the hero of their dreams. In the Avatar, however, the ideal becomes manifest almost fully for manifestation is ever an aberration of the Absolute.

2. We must unite to protect the territorial integrity of the motherland at this time of great national crisis.

3. Education of the masses the Indian way is the need of the hour. 'Women and the masses', Swamiji had exhorted us to raise so that the country may rise to its full stature as of yore.

4. These are terrible times when the motherland is threatened with fissiparous tendencies from within and territorial threats from foreign adversaries. We must empower ourselves militarily if we are not to fall prey to foreign aggression yet again.

5. School children must be brought up today on the basis of the leonine principles of Swami Vivekananda. They must be provided with Ramakrishna-Vivekananda literature to help build up their character while still in bloom. Only then will we get to becoming a nation of strength in the future.

6. The past, the present and the future hold us in their thrall and we may not deny them their due. So, many rake up the past, many live engrossed in their present and many are visionaries who peer into the unborn future fraught with possibilities, fruition of their aspirations and dreams.

7. How can we respect our present President when he failed to do so to our first President and our only one ever of undivided India? Our first President was Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose of the Provisional Government of Free India established on 21 Oct, 1943.

8. A nation under grave threat from internal and external security issues yet holds on to that stubborn line of lies about the practice of non-violence as being the cause of its independence. 1962 did teach a lesson and we rectified our stance much. Shall another invasion complete the task before we learn to give the revolutionaries for freedom their dues and imbibe their principles of robust nationalism which will help secure our borders and keep our house in order as well?

9. Unity of purpose, unity of effort and unity of aspiration will integrate the nation but these are to be built on the golden ideas of sacrifice for the common weal and service to the nation with the ennobling end of Self-realisation as the master ideal.

10. How wonderful that we do not know our status as citizens of this country in full even after 70 years of Partition, in the absence of transparency about the Transfer of Power Documents!

NETAJI DISAPPEARANCE MYSTERY

This group page is intended to publishing all available data on the disappearance case of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and all the theories that abound about his possible fate post 18 August, 1945. No specific inclination does this page have towards a particular theory but it shall provide space to all to establish their specific cases.

It is a request to all the members to post only such material as are related to the disappearance of Netaji and his possible whereabouts thereafter. The posts must not be casual correspondence or stray opinion but must be rational propositions based on evidence or what would appear to many as near-evidence, for this is, after all, not a legal forum where such accuracy may always subsist, knowing the fallibility of the ardent mind when it comes to association with such a national soul as Netaji who belongs to each and every Indian and to whom the whole of undivided India formed the fabric of his wide family with his large sympathy extending to all and excluding none, however antithetical he or she may have been to him in political persuasion or ideological inclination.

The nation mattered to Netaji above all else and the nation demands today the rightful closure of his disappearance case, not on the basis of fabrications and falsifications but on the firm foundation of duly conducted investigation and research into all available data without any malefic motivation or perfidious political intent clouding the case and rendering it into a sham of a sentence passed on India's premier patriot.

I rest my case here and exhort the members to take it up hereon in their bid to resolving this longstanding mystery about a man who we owe our very independence to.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/netaji.disappearance.mystery/

STATEMENT OFF THE SOUL ... 6

1. The call for freedom sounded from Dakshineshwar included the freedom of the motherland from British-bondage as well. Spiritual freedom without political freedom of the masses is meaningless. Then comes economic freedom, social freedom, freedom from exploitation of the powers that be.

2. Such an oblivion of the sacrifices of the revolutionaries who gave their all for freedom does not augur well for the country and it is time that this historical perversion is resisted, thwarted and done away with by conscientious citizens taking up the crusade to restore the true history of the freedom struggle and the correct narrative of the age-old civilisation that is Bharatvarsha.

3. Vivekananda's children must be bold, pure as snow and dedicated to the motherland to the hilt even as Netaji was.

4. The nation shall yet rise in the name of Ramakrishna-Vivekananda and in the name of their spiritual child, Netaji. None can resist the path of this national resurgence, however determined be they in their perfidious designs.

5. Those that belittle Netaji's contribution to the freedom struggle belong to the realm of ignorance.

6. Netaji was the liberator of the motherland from bondage to the British. Alas, were he there to prevent Partition as well!

7. Open-minded inquiry into the disappearance mystery of Netaji is the call of the hour and not closed mind-sets intent on establishing prejudices, pompous and proud.

8. Is Vivekananda remembered by us simply because of the continued good work done by the Ramakrishna Mission? Are we that self-deluded a nation? Then whither hope?

9. Do we love Netaji? Then why do we not renounce for him? Patriotism is fulfilled is renunciation for it demands sacrifice untold.

10. As a nation we bear collective responsibility. Only then will we rise when we realise this reality of our citizenship status.

WHY THIS DECREE OF DEATH ON NETAJI OVER AND OVER AGAIN?

His decree of death was delivered long time back. The twice elected President of the Indian National Congress, the dependent nation's rebel to the Crown, owing to the ineptness of the British-appeasing leadership of the land, had to that day in great secrecy, in disguise, incognito, leave the shores of the motherland, risking his very life. When the fugitive was crossing the difficult mountainous terrain of Kabul, Kandahar and Afghanistan, the British intelligence was then smarting under the snub to their snobbery. Despite being foiled in broad daylight to eliminate Subhas Bose like they had heinously done in the case of Bhagat Singh and Jatin Das, the British now delivered on Bose in top secrecy a barbarous, violent decree of death. The notorious Scotland Yard was instructed to shoot at sight the fugitive Europe-bound Bose. But they were foiled this time as well.

From Germany the address, ''This is Subhas Chandra Bose speaking..." or the three month submarine journey culminating in the armed assault of Netaji from the South-east Asian theatre of war on British India actuated the hasty departure of the British from Indian soil, handing over power on the basis of legal terms and conditions to the palace-incarcerated leadership, now weary of the revolution of fasting. In February 1942 and in April 1945 this fake news of the death of Netaji and his entourage by air-crash was rumoured by the British to break up the worldwide network of Netaji at every level. A revolutionary of rare intellect, Subhas Bose, using this misinformation as his armament, spread the fictitious tale of his air-crash death at Taihoku on 18 August, 1945 to disappear along the Russian track and left behind many an incongruous link to indicate his future return along a newer path.

To free his path of enjoyment of power
      

STATEMENT OFF THE SOUL ... 5

1. Where is our national self-respect in our belonging to the British Commonwealth despite the loot and the savagery the British perpetrated on Indian soil for two centuries and more?

2. How could the leaders succumb t the pleasures of the hour, to the perfidies of the times to partition the motherland and, so, destroy the millenia-old heritage of a united Bharatvarsha?

3. The British met an adversary in Ramakrishna who upset all their plans of a sustained colonisation of India. The seer of Dakshineshwar worked up a revolution through his fiery disciple, Vivekananda, who in turn set fire to the souls of the revolutionaries climaxing in Subhas Chandra Bose to evict the British from the holy land.

4. Macaulay tried to subvert the culture of India through his carefully crafted 'Minutes on Education' in 1836. But the very same year Ramakrishna was born to counter this challenge to the age-old spiritual culture of India. In fulfilment of the prophesy of the Bhagavad Geeta, the Avatar once more appeared in Bharatvarsha to save the virtuous, destroy the vicious and to establish righteousness here on earth.

5. This world is going to pieces in the absence of heart. Intellect counts for little. It is the heart that is the seat of all power and it is here that the deficiency of civilisation today lies.

6. Bengal has betrayed Netaji ; India has been ungrateful to all account. Does a nation of cowards deserve the hero?

7. The poor are the living gods ; upon their shoulders is built civilisation.

8. The old have become dispensable commodity. Who cares for them who held us in their wombs, in their arms?

9. The path of Ramakrishna-Vivekananda is the path of Netaji. It is but a political variant of their fundamental idea of freedom.

10. The revolutionaries were not misguided patriots but were supremely renounced souls who sacrificed their everything at the altar of the freedom of their motherland.

STATEMENT OFF THE SOUL ... 4

1. The night darkens and, yet, no sign of renunciation. O souls, awake, lest slumber overtakes and the hour is past!

2. When truth is to be presented, hard facts based on evidence must come to the fore without the attempt to sway public opinion through verbal effusions.

3. Netaji, betrayed, maligned and erased from history books, yet arises to his full stature like the phoenix from the ashes, although, 'ashes' sounds so ironical in this context.

4. He stands alone atop the cliff with a sole thought racking his soul, oh! the well-being of his motherland.

5. Purity, courage and faith in the twin-ideal of service and renunciation is the call of the hour.

6. Let these words of Sankara be enshrined in your soul once and for all --- God alone is the Truth, the universe is false and all sentience is divine.

7. The movement is on but where are the men? Who shall move the principles into practice and bring forth the transformation that is the aspired end?

8. Does the word without the power of the thought behind count at all? Frothy expression devoid of spiritual substance will not change society but the silent power of penetrative thought will surely transform.

9. Why, I wonder, there is such a deal of disunity among those that are striving to unravel the Netaji disappearance mystery? Time to unite.

10. The British cheated us for two centuries and more. Now why do we cheat ourselves?

STATEMENT OFF THE SOUL ... 3

1. People will lose faith in researchers if they provide erroneous information on You Tube video and fail to acknowledge the same.

2. Today's renascent womanhood owes its rise to the advent of Sri Sarada Devi, if we are to repose faith in what Swamiji beheld as true.

3. Men of character alone can lead the masses to their good. The ones that lead today are utterly devoid of character and the result is there for you to see.

4. Obliterate the ego if you will serve the nation. Cast aside all self-interest and make the nation your self.

5. The secret of success lies in concentration and purity is the precondition for concentration. Else, you ruin yourself and others with your poor-play.

6. Selflessness is more paying in the long run than shortsighted selfishness which leads to eventual ruin. Leaders, absorb Netaji's ideals and try and emulate him.

7. Truth is self-established and has not to be established by defeating adversaries in verbal duel. The truth about Netaji is such as well.

8. A fractured house and a fractured nation and a fractured world. Where lies the hope for humanity? Ramakrishna.

9. Awndhero aalok jwaley hridaye.
Shei aaolokei tnar din;
ghnuchey jay andhaarero raat.

10. It pains me to see campaigners for justice for Netaji use improper language as they go about their campaigning. Shame!

SANGHITA, A SONG CELESTIAL

Among the unnumbered faces that frequent my vision, this little girl stands out in her pristine purity and her Vidya-sanskar. And, yet, theirs are but brief visitations to this terrestrial plane to mop up unfinished work whence on fruition they fly to their celestial abode. The life lived so short surpasses more enduring stay in sublimity of expression, in innocence of being and in the endearing attribute that binds all in a surfeit of soulful love given and an ethereal aura abiding that decades hence men recall the wispy dreams they had dreamed in her presence. Sanghita, true to her name, binds all who knew her and all who are getting to know in a common bond of spiritual love and, thus, even in her physical absence she holds all in familial feeling, in a fraternal identity, and, so, renders unto humanity a service spiritual which men in flesh and form fail to achieve. My veneration for the father who ever brings her to the fore for us, lesser mortals, to bathe in the Ganga of her vibrations ever so often every time the moon passes in her heavenly orb. And Sanghita then sings her song celestial thrilling the fibre of her father's being to its very essence where resides she at one with the Mother who brought her into being.

STATEMENT OFF THE SOUL ... 2

1. Renunciation was the watchword of the revolutionaries dedicated to the motherland.

2. Satyajit Ray --- a master craftsman, a cinematic genius, a renaissance personality.

3. Arrogance in eminence is a common vice that is best avoided for sustenance of public welfare.

4. They raise you to power, they may pull you off it. So, leaders of the masses, beware!

5. Ramakrishna gave the world Vivekananda. Vivekananda gave the world 'the symphony of the soul'.

6. Devotees of Netaji must be like him, of sterling strength full of renunciation of the ephemeral pleasures of life and totally devoted to the motherland.

7. Sri Ramakrishna has said,"God-realisation is the goal of life." How many of us are readying for that?

8. Lies abound sullying the life of Netaji. What ingratitude! What a shame! What happened to him? What is his status?

9. Satyameva jayate and perpetrating lies about Netaji. Is this the national philosophy? A nation of cowards only will allow this.

10. Researchers on Netaji must be fluent with facts, pleasant in presentation with good diction and proper pronunciation. Jai Hind!

STATEMENT OFF THE SOUL ... 1

1. Genius is an extreme imbalance seeking equilibrium.

2. If we do not accept the message of Swamiji and Netaji, our country will have a precipitous fall into the abyss of oblivion.

3. The first quality of leadership is truthfulness for it is the bedrock of character, the very foundation of it.

4. Netaji brought us freedom and we brought him oblivion. Shame!

5. Vivekananda had the greatest faith in the youth for bringing about the human revolution. Arise O youth brigade, awake to his call!

6. Work, service, worship --- these are the three grades of karma yoga.

7. Nivedita was the anchor during Sir J.C. Bose's hour of trial and tribulation.

8. A multifaceted genius, Sister Nivedita, the rarest of souls.

9. Ramakrishna must be approached through perfect adherence to truth and purity.

10. Ramakrishna is the Way. Meditate on his life and message.

AUROBINDO GHOSE --- MY CONVICTIONS

Sugata Bose I am sorry to say, Nandan Chaudhury, that Subhas Chandra Bose, on the contrary, was highly critical of Aurobindo Ghose's running away from revolutionary life post his experience of internment in a British prison. Subhas Chandra Bose was inspired by the valorous Vivekananda instead. Netaji's stance in life was at sharp variance with that of Aurobindo.

Sugata Bose Early ideas of Subhas Chandra Bose hinged on the hope that Aurobindo Ghose would after a while of self-exile seek an opportune moment to return to revolutionary activity for freedom of the motherland. However, when that did not materialise with the passage of time, later on Subhas Chandra Bose absolutely repudiated the sustained relinquishing of revolutionary work by Aurobindo and criticised him for not joining the freedom movement. In his ethical code Subhas Chandra had said, "Embracing sannyas when your country needs you is a refined from of betrayal." Again in the same ethical code he had said, "By disacarding life, you cannot attain the life divine."

Sugata Bose Nandan Chaudhury, I hold the view that Aurobindo Ghosh had run away from revolutionary life and sought asylum in Pondicherry out of fear. Envisioning Vivekananda was no joke and I am inclined to rejecting this affirmation of Aurobindo. A true sadhak is fearless and, hence, my considered and considerable doubt about the real case.

Sugata Bose But let me tell you Nandan that despite all these happenings and their diverse interpretations of which I hold one, I hold Aurobindo Ghose / Sri Aurobindo as dear for his overall contribution to Indian thought, although, I do not again subscribe to his stupendous spiritual claims and fantastic philosophy. His clarity of intellectual thinking as opposed to philosophical or spiritual thinking appeals to my mind and his writing also somewhat resonates to the creative one within me.

FOR THOSE THAT CARE FOR THE NAMELESS ONES

It is character that is the force in spirituality; it is purity that moves the masses; it is service and unsullied love that win the sympathy of the people. Cultivate these and the world will rally round you.

Seek not the support of the rich for the masses are your real strength. Money can scarce make any worthwhile change in human society; it is love and genuine concern for all that strike chords in the human heart and bring about gradual transformation in society.

Those that wish to work for the masses must identify with them but on an enlightened basis and not on that of fanatical ideology or political aspiration. The masses suffer everywhere and they have suffered so for ages. They have been the makers of civilisation, these millions of mute victims of social tyranny who for all the persecutions of an unjust world order have, nonetheless, by their labour produced the priceless possessions humanity has been heir to and whose spilled blood from their burst veins have built the edifice of all that is glorious and all that is commonplace in human civilisation.

The history of the world is the life-story of these masses of the freshest flowers of humanity whose toil and tears have shaped the course of human existence but whose sacrifices have been allowed to slip into oblivion for want of suitable representation of their cause in ages gone by when their animal labour was all that mattered to the tyrannical upper classes and they were fodder for the feudal lords, their lives worth a pittance.

If such be your love, my brothers, that you wish to pull these masses up from their dark dungeons to the sunshine of life’s efflorescent spring, then give them culture, the right education, to restore them their lost individuality. The task is onerous but attainable if you are armed in supernal love for your kith and kin, your flesh and blood, your very Self in so many garbs, in so many forms, so much so that life ought to be a veritable festival of worshipful service when all around abound kindred spirits fraught with the depth-divine but suffering in oblivion of their essential identity. So, may it be that some among you be fired up by the idealism of youth and, awakening to the divine within you, set up sympathetic flames of love in others for the poor masses that know not the light of day despite the declaration of democracy for all.

Hail my pure, pristine protagonists of the people! For you is the stage set to safeguard the rights of man; for you is the tide in full flow to carry across the ocean of life these billions of survivors of the barbarism of the ages. Character, purity, love --- let these be the watchwords of your movement to restore the balance of life and usher in a new era of equality and justice for all.

A DEVELOPING DIALOGUE ON POLITICAL RALLIES BLOCKING AVENUES AND DISRUPTING LIFE

A sea of fools as Carlyle irreverently in a variant manner said about the population of England, devoid of understanding of their own good and disruptive at that too.

You say that the masses are democratically alive and aware as they exhibited during the 1977 Lok Sabha Elections when they voted Indira Gandhi out of power for her dictatorial ways as exemplified by the infamous Emergency. Yet, for all this apparent wisdom of the masses, the country is in political shambles with ethical principles exiting from public life and daily debilitating the already abysmal state of the populace.

You say that you harbour hope for the future and have faith in the next generation who will bring about a better state of things in national life. I, too, have hope but do not posit much of it in political gatherings with malefic intent. Where sounding the depth of one's control over the electorate dictates the calling of rallies, at once disruptive of civic life as also directed to misleading the masses on contentious issues that affect national life, I stand clear at one with Swami Vivekananda to call for renunciation and service as the basis of national life instead of holding congregations hostage to political agendas like this.

You say that you are apolitical, that you are devoted to Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and that you accept my mission of spreading the message and life-giving principles of Swamiji and Netaji but differ in perspective on mass rallies that block civic life, holding the same as imperative to the democratic process. Well, then you ought to have by now understood the import of my statements, never in contradiction to Netaji or Swamiji but in affirmation of their highest principles of national reconstruction.

You say that you agree with me much in principle but not quite in practice on specifics. Very well, you are welcome to your judgement and I to mine.

DEBATE BETWEEN MADHURI BOSE AND MYSELF

Narayanan Gandhi In Justin Li's thread Madhuri Bose said otherwise.

Sugata Bose Narayanan Gandhi, true it is that Madhuri Bose said so but I am strongly inclined to believing that she must have made the error and not Justice Mukherjee who did extensive research and did not for sure indulge in a mere cursory glance through the facts and figures to arrive at his conclusion.

Madhuri Bose Sugata Bose, Are you sure you have read Justice Mukherjee's Report in full and Habib-ur Rahman's testimony? I have.

Sugata Bose No, Madhuridi, I have read it very sparingly but have articulated my view on a very natural basis on the assumption that Justice Mukherjee who headed the Commission must have gone through the facts and figures very thoroughly and without making such errors as pointed out by you for he was aided ably by assistants well versed in the trade of sifting through information. Hence, my position was what I stated it to be. However, there is a very low possibility still for a human error which I very much doubt though but cannot quite rule out absolutely for the reason stated.

Madhuri Bose You have read only 'in parts' but you said 'I am sure she (i.e me Madhuri) must have made the error and not Justice Mukherjee who did extensive research' !!!

Sugata Bose I have edited my words which were actually unintended in the import that they literally convey but which I meant in the way of 'I feel' or 'I guess' or 'I am strongly inclined to believing', for we often do use the words 'I am sure' in the said sense.

Madhuri Bose I am sorry Sugata Bose that is irresponsible on your part. So you assume I have not gone through 'the facts and figures very thoroughly' before making a judgement? ? I am very disappointed. Be thorough yourself and read everything that is relevant before you challenge others. I am tired of irresponsible persons who are ready to solve the Netaji mystery!

Sugata Bose I cannot imagine that Justice Mukherjee --- who headed the Commission --- and his team were less thorough than you were about the stated study. There are many reasons other than the one stated by you which were contentious points for tilting the scales against the air-crash theory. We are debating about a side issue. I am not being irresponsible at all. I may also ask you to read up a lot on many a controversy about Netaji's life which has cast aspersions on his spotless character and made him appear like an irresponsible person at that. However, I find that despite no dearth of evidence and also an utter lack of evidence as the case may be, there is no effort on many to clear the calumny that has smeared the name of India's holiest patriot. When documents are exhibited, there is no opposition shown to them and, yet, theories about Netaji's status abound. This is unfortunate for the great hero who I worship deserves better.

Madhuri Bose Habib-ur Rahman was the key witness in the air crash story. I am sorry to say that Justice Mukherjee got Habib's evidence completely wrong. This did not help at all to disprove the air crash story. To understand what I am saying and why I am saying so, you need to: (1) Read Habib-ur Rahman's testimony; and (2) Read Justice Mukherjee's Report in full.

Sugata Bose I do not have Habib-ur-Rahman's testimony at my disposal, so I cannot read it for the while but I can surely go through the JMCI Report and the Dissentient Report of Suresh Chandra Bose. There was no air-crash after all. So, how does Habib-ur-Rahman's testimony count at all?

Madhuri Bose Justice Mukherjee used Habib-ur Rahman's testimony to prove that the air crash did not happen. But he misunderstood or mis-read Habib's testimony!

Sugata Bose So, why do you not raise this issue in the media to bring it to everybody's notice and disprove the validity of the JMCI's findings? Also, what are your objections, if any, to the lack of evidence to support the occurrence of the alleged air-crash? What is the evidence that you can cite in favour of the crash other than to say that there were eye-witnesses like Habib-ur-Rahman and others, a line of logic which is flawed if it cannot be proved with documentary evidence or pronounced circumstantial evidence that, after all, the stated air-crash had taken place? It is a cyclically flawed reasoning which will not validate the crash.

SOME STRANGE CONNECTIONS

How were these two personalities (Lal Bahadur Shastri and Leela Roy) connected to the disappearance of Netaji? Enlighten us if you have knowledge about it please.

Leela Roy apparently had met Bhagawanji for almost a decade and accepted him as Netaji. She has, I have heard, written about the same in a letter. May we have the contents of this letter here please? Shall somebody oblige us with this service? That would prove crucial, even if not definitive, to the determination of the case, for Leela Roy's evidence is no throwaway piece of fantastic notion of a gullible mind but the considered judgement of a seasoned revolutionary used to the discrimination of underground revolutionary activity. Moreover, Leela Roy had seen both Netaji and Bhagawanji and, hence, she was in a far better position to judge than some others who have seen Bhagawanji but not Netaji in person.

Who was it that Lal Bahadur Shastri had apparently met in Tashkent (1966) about whom on his return home he would break the news to his countrymen that would 'make things alright'? The information was cremated with him. What an unnatural death, possibly by poisoning, at such a strikingly unnatural hour in his life! No postmortem done. Why? Who was / were behind this sudden demise / murder? Any connection to Netaji?

The 'Tashkent man' is reportedly wearing a wig. Hence, there are obvious differences in his appearance from that of Netaji. The Tashkent man is seen having thick black hair while Netaji's hair had highly receded and was greying. The difference in hair-spread has caused a marked difference in facial appearance to the discerning eye. However, forensic face-mapping done by British expert Neil Miller says otherwise. According to Miller, the two faces are an almost match of each other. Now, this is evidence scientific and no gullibility of the naked eye. Removing the wig from the Tashkent man's head apparently makes for identity with Netaji's face, so protagonists of this theory say. Now, what is the truth? I, for one, do not know for sure at any rate. I leave it to members for their reasoned deliberations.
Regarding the 'Paris man' it must be said that he has a great deal of facial similarity with that of Netaji and seems about roughly the same height and physical stature, although, he is much more sprightly and, apparently, less spiritual in mannerism. But the question arises --- this Paris Man is so youthful and Netaji by 1969 would have been 72 years old and definitely much more mellowed in his movements. Hence, the doubt arises and persists.

IN RESPONSE TO SEVERAL QUERIES BY AN INTERESTED ONE

1. Japan was the ally of the Provisional Govt. of Free India (PGFI) against the Anglo-American forces during the Second World War. It was agreed that the INA would be at the forefront of the offensive against the British Indian Army and any Indian territory falling into the hands of the Imperial Japanese Army would be forthwith handed over to the INA and thereby to the PGFI. In this connection it may be noted that the Japanese did fulfil their promise both in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands which they handed over to the PGFI, and later in North-east India where they handed over all of the conquered territory of Mnaipur.

2. Any government formed on behalf of a dependent nation is customarily called Provisional Government. This is the standard international practice and Netaji followed the same. The word 'provisional' is used to denote something which is interim and not final. Remember the Constitution of a nation not having been drafted yet, the government formed of it cannot be but provisional.

3. Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose was in charge of the Provisional Govt. of Free India as its constitutional head as well as the Supreme Commander of its army, the Indian National Army. Japan was not a part of the PGFI at all. The PGFI and the INA operated in alliance with Imperial Japan and her army through the intermediary of the Hikari Kikan which did the work of liaison. But the PGFI had total sovereignty, having received diplomatic recognition from nine States of the world including those of Germany, Japan, Italy and USSR. The INA as such was, thus, completely under the independent command of the PGFI and bore no allegiance to Imperial Japan.

4. After the surrender of Japan on 15 August, 1945, Netaji ordered for ceasefire and not surrender of the INA to the Anglo-American forces. Instead of guerrilla warfare he ordered retreat of his forces to carry on a second liberation struggle soon with Soviet help for which purpose he even feigned the air-crash and entered Soviet territory to ally with it in his crusade against colonial and imperial subjection of India. Netaji thought that when he was confident of Soviet help in his war of liberation of India --- and this conviction of his was founded on his prior diplomatic work conducted with the Soviet authorities during the war ---, it would be a far less effective option to go for guerrilla warfare against the mighty Anglo-Americans. What would have been his chances of success against the victorious Allies with 34 thousand remaining INA soldiers doing guerrilla combat? Far better and, surely, favourably decisive would be his alliance with the mighty victorious Soviet Union who for ideological reasons would now surely turn their back on the Anglo-Americans and carry out their crusade against colonialism and imperialism. In this they would find in Netaji with his national cause a natural ally and, so, Netaji went for alliance with USSR and not for a disastrous guerrilla warfare.

RAMAKRISHNA-VIVEKANANDA AND NETAJI ... 1

Let Ramakrishna devotees never forget that Netaji was a supreme devotee of Sri Ramakrishna and gave his entire life and energy to fulfilling the grand purpose of his appearance, that is, the saving of the virtuous, the destruction of the vicious and the establishment of righteousness here on earth.

HE LIVES FOR US, DO WE LIVE FOR HIM?

This strange stance of some to pit the rational versus the irrational or the ones prone to hyper-imagination versus the ones armed in so-called rationality is a sorry attempt to divert discourse from that which comes naturally to many. Netaji being an iconic figure of epic proportions would demand a serious study of both his life that is historically recorded as well as his whereabouts post his disappearance. The constant denigration of his possible incarnation as Gumnami Baba and the labelling of the adherents of the monk incognito theory as being dreamers, subscribers to mystery fiction and having other malefic agendas does in no way advance the cause of either the study of the historical Netaji or the research into his disappearance.

While it may be true that among a diverse collection of people, some may utilise the conspiracy theories abounding on Netaji for personal ends, it is also true that many are sincere adherents of this theory to whom after detailed research it has seemed a very credible possibility of Netaji being the monk extraordinaire living in absolute seclusion in different parts of Uttar Pradesh. Again it may be posited that it would be impossible for Netaji to remain in such seclusion for the sun does not forever remain under cloud cover. But inscrutable are the ways of the Lord and defy the bounds of reason, the Lord Himself being the supreme focus of all that includes and yet transcends such reason.

Standing on the edge of a precipice on all sides with not an inch-space to gain foothold, witnessing the cataclysmic destruction of the war that had laid waste to all one cherished in life, killed by the tens of millions the fairest flowers of humanity the world over, wiped out cities and civilisations with it, what may have transpired in the consciousness of Netaji is not for ordinary mortals to conceive. Given his pronounced spiritual propensity and his advanced leanings to it, is it not natural for him when denied entry into India by brotherly betrayal of Nehru to recoil within his self and research into the grand interior that yet awaited him with open arms and offered him asylum?