The Hindu : National : British Foreign Office plotted to kill Netaji in 1941, says historian

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Aug 15, 2005

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British Foreign Office plotted to kill Netaji in 1941, says historian

Special Correspondent

KOLKATA: The British Foreign Office had ordered the assassination of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose in March 1941 during his great escape from India and reconfirmed the order in June 1941, the internationally known historian Eunan O'Halpin, Professor of History, Trinity College, Dublin, said here on Sunday.

Prof. O' Halpin was delivering the Sisir Kumar Bose Lecture on "Assassination in Defence of Empire: Subhas Chandra Bose and British Intelligence, 1939-1945" at the Netaji Research Bureau.

Official documents relating to London's decision to assassinate Netaji were handed over to Krishna Bose, niece-in-law of Netaji and chairperson of the Bureau.

According to the historian, the British Foreign Office learnt on February 27, 1941 — after decoding an Italian telegram — that Subhas Bose might be in Kabul after his escape from Calcutta on January 16-17.

On March 7 the British Special Operations Executive (SOE), formed in 1940 for sabotage, underground propaganda and other clandestine activities, informed its representatives in Istanbul and in Cairo that Netaji "was understood to be travelling from Afghanistan to Germany via Iran, Iraq and Turkey."

They were asked to "wire what arrangements they could make for his assassination," Prof. O' Halpin said.

Remarkable instruction

"Even in the midst of war this was a remarkable instruction. Bose undoubtedly planned rebellion to set India free, but the usual remedy for that was prosecution or detention, not unavowed assassination," Prof. O' Halpin said.

"He was to die because he had a large following in India... London's decision to assassinate is also striking for the very fact that any trace of it remains in official records."

Netaji reached Berlin on April 2, 1941 via Russia. But, according to Prof. O' Halpin, the British SOE in Istanbul inquired whether the assassination order still stood.

Once the decision was confirmed London cabled SOE in Istanbul "informing de Chastelain that the Foreign Office agreed to the liquidation of Chandra Bose being carried out on Turkish territory, but he should inform nobody," Prof. O'Halpin said.

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