“Double,
double toil and trouble,
Fire
burn and cauldron bubble.”
The
Ousting of Netaji Subhas Bose, Part II
Hi, Everyone! Subhas
Bose was put in a very precarious position now that the Working Committee had
shown their true colors. The Tripuri Congress session was coming up. Though
seriously ill, Bose would have to
attend or be a pushover for the Gandhian Congress members so determined to oust
him.
At this time, Gandhi
began a two-pronged fast on March 3, 1939, just days before the Tripuri
Congress session. One goal of the fast was to compel the Thakore of Rajkot to
buckle under and redeem his pledge made to the people, and the other was to
divert the attention from the Congress session and keep it riveted on his
health.
He had used his “poor”
health and fasts countless times before to get his way!
Keer writes in Mahatma Gandhi, Political Saint and Unarmed
Prophet (page 661-663):
The Tripuri Congress was held from
March 10 to 12, 1939, under the presidency of Subhas Bose who was seriously
ill. . . . On the eve of the session, Gandhi had sent a message
asking Subhas not to defy the medical advice and desiring him to regulate
the proceedings from Calcutta!
By his fast unto death, Gandhi had
riveted the Congress workers’ attention on him, created consternation among his
opponents and anguish in his sympathizers and followers.
In his presidential address, Bose
desired the Congress to give an ultimatum to the British Government. Although
seriously ill, Bose tried in vain to control the Congress, but at the eleventh
hour the socialists, Royist and other leftists did not support him.”
[All the
Congress members knew very well what was the fate of one who opposed the will
of the Mahatma. We have seen it too, in the last so many posts. And so no one
wanted to reveal their identity while voting.]
“A large number of All-India
Congress Committee members said that if they openly voted against the wishes of
Ministers [most of whom were Gandhist] they would get into trouble. So they
wanted a secret ballot.
The suggestion was turned down. The
result was that the Congress expressed its confidence in the members of the
Working Committee who had resigned.
It [Working Committee] stifled
Subhas Bose and resolved, overruling its constitution, that Subhas Bose, the
President, must form his Working Committee in accordance with the wishes of the
Mahatma. . . .
Subhas Bose returned to Calcutta
with body and hopes shattered.
Bose thereafter wrote to Gandhi and
tried to win his support in forming the Working Committee, but Gandhi did not
respond to his appeals. Nehru tried half-heartedly to bring about a compromise
between Gandhi and Bose. He wrote to Gandhi: ‘You should accept Subhas as
President. To try push him out seems to me to be an exceedingly wrong step.’
Yet the Mahatma was ruthless. It
was Gandhi’s dictum that however you repair it, a rift is a rift. Another of
his dictums was that to forgive is not to forget. . .
Bose had to resign. He was the first
Congress President to do so.”
There are many more tales to tell of Gandhi
and Congress machinations, the most relevant being the ruthless way—discarding
all principle of nonviolence and truth—the Congress annihilated any chance the
Hindu Mahasabha had of winning the 1945 elections. That saga is given in detail
in my novel Burning for Freedom. I
shall not be posting on it just yet.
Tomorrow we shall see
how Gandhi overturned the decisions of the Working Committee of the Congress
that did not suit him!
Anurupa
Mahatma Gandhi Facts:
Gandhi Revealed
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