The mystery surrounding Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose’s disappearance continues to captivate and perplex, demanding renewed attention. In The Bose Deception: Declassified, authors Anuj Dhar and Chandrachur Ghose unapologetically confront this critical issue, backed by painstaking research and an exhaustive examination of over 2,000 declassified documents from India, the UK, the USA, and Taiwan. This engrossing investigative account dismantles the layers of secrecy, exposing a deception plan that has gripped India for decades. Now in a new book they unravel another secret wherein a new claim has emerged around the death of Neta ji.
The declassification of over 1,300 secret files by the Government of India beginning in January 2016, including those from the PMO, MEA, MHA, and Cabinet Secretariat, opened a new chapter in this historical enigma. These documents revealed that even seven decades after Bose’s disappearance, the authorities had preserved troves of classified material shrouded in mystery. Dhar and Ghose dive deep into this treasure trove of records, challenging the official narrative of Bose’s death in a plane crash in Taiwan—a claim rooted in government inquiries but far from universally accepted.
Dhar and Ghose, further say that the Narendra Modi government, which is open to new inputs, should examine this new input which they say has the potential to “change everything”.
In 2017, after an RTI reply backing the plane crash theory caused a stir, the Ministry of Home Affairs clarified that this reply was based on the decision taken by the Manmohan Singh government, and that “any other credible inputs would be examined”.
According to the Japanese, Subhas Bose boarded a plane carrying Lt General Tsunamasa Shidei (picture). On 18 August 1945, this plane crashed inside Taipei aerodrome, killing the both. Bodies of Bose and Shidei were cremated in Taipei and their ashes sent to Tokyo. All this unfolded days after the Japanese surrendered, when Bose was facing an imminent arrest.
However, as per the Chinese war historians cited by Dhar and Ghose, Lt General Shidei was never with Bose at that time. He died in an altogether different incident in entirely different circumstances.
The Japanese claim of Bose and Shidei’s death at the same place was upheld in 2006 by the Manmohan Singh government. That government did so after it rejected the finding of the commission led by former Supreme Court judge MK Mukherjee that the Japanese circulated a fake new of Bose’s death to provide cover for his escape towards Soviet Russia. Mukherjee evidenced that the body of a Japanese solider was passed off as that of Bose as part of this plan. He further evidenced in his report that Shidei’s death was also not proven.
In view of the details given by Chinese historians, Dhar and Ghose think that Shidei’s death was made use of by the Japanese as a cover for Bose’s escape towards Soviet Russia. The authors say that this revelation, when read with other evidence on record, brings down the entire plane crash theory of Netaji’s death.
The Japanese claim of Bose and Shidei’s death was upheld in 2006 by the Manmohan Singh government as it rejected the finding of the commission led by former Supreme Court judge MK Mukherjee that the Japanese circulated a fake new of Bose’s death to provide cover for his escape towards Soviet Russia. Mukherjee evidenced that the body of a Japanese solider was passed off as that of Bose as part of this plan. He further evidenced in his report that Shidei’s death was also not proven.
Now, there is a credible input from the Chinese side that Shidei’s plane was shot down by them. Shidei went down in the sea along with another general, not Bose. Many Chinese historians have stated this in their books. Most notably, war historians Zhang Zishen and Xue Chunde recount this in their book The Pillar of Shame in History: A Complete Record of the Deaths of 171 Japanese Generals Who Invaded China. The book (picture) was published in 2009 by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) press, Beijing.
Zishen and Chunde have written many books on military history, focusing with focus on the Chinese struggle against the Japanese. Their books, and TV series based on them their works, have won national awards in China. Zishen and Chunde state that Shidei was in Taipei days before he supposedly arrived there and later died along with Bose. Major General Suguru Sato formally received Shidei in Taipei on August 5. On August 18, a plane carrying Shidei and Sato took off from Taipei. It was detected by the US Navy. Alerted by the Americans, the Chinese sent their fighters to intercept Shidei’s plane. It was ordered to make an emergency landing at a designated airport. When the Japanese refused to comply with the order, the plane was shot at, leading to its plunge into the East China Sea.
Dhar and Ghose say that they have no reason to dispute the Chinese version of Shidei’s death as they are a disinterested party. “We are afraid we cannot say the same for the Japanese and Indian governments who have concealed facts as proven by Justice Mukherjee’s report. Our own research also shows that.”
The authors say that there is no evidence to show that Bose and Shidei arrived in Taipei together on 18 August. While Bose was photographed on August 17 (picture), there is no photograph of his with Shidei here and subsequently in Taipei.
The eyewitness accounts are massively contradictory on what happened to Shidei after the plane crash, whether or not he was taken to the hospital. No one attended his cremation in Taipei. The Japanese govt never supplied any contemporary records about his death. The India government file/records containing correspondence with the Japanese concerning Shidei’s death have gone missing. The cremation records accessed in Taipei by Justice Mukherjee prove that Shidei and Bose were not cremated there despite the Japanese claims that they were.
The first inquiry into Bose’s death was carried out by the US army. The American assessment (picture) that there was no direct evidence of Bose’s death has been known to the Government of India but concealed like other inputs going against the official plane crash theory of Bose’s death.
Dhar and Ghose appeal to the Modi government to take up the issue of Shidei’s death with the Chinese and Japanese it is intrinsically interlinked. “The Japanese said that both Bose and Shidei died together, the Chinese say that they killed Shidei in a separate incident. These two claims cannot be reconciled,” say Dhar and Ghose. “The excuses given by the Manmohan Singh government for the absence of records relating to the death and cremation of Bose cannot be given in the case of a senior general of the Japanese army.”
