He tragically passed away in the early hours of June 23, 1953. He was just 52. A member of Lok Sabha, part of independent India’s first cabinet and a prominent opposition leader thereafter, he had been detained without any trial by the J&K government in May 1953. He was also the founder of Bharatiya Jan Sangh that later transformed into Bharatiya Janata Party, the current ruling dispensation in India.
It was in Geneva that Nehru learnt of Syama Babu’s death. The grief stricken mother of Syama Babu, Jogmaya Devi, wrote a letter to Nehru: “My son died in detention, detention without trial … you say you had visited Kashmir during my son’s detention. You speak of the affection you had for him. But what prevented you, I wonder, from meeting him there personally and satisfying yourself about his health and arrangements? … ever since his detention there, the first information that I, his mother, received from the Government of Jammu and Kashmir was that my son was no more … and in what cruel cryptic way the message was conveyed.” Further communication between Jogmaya Devi and Nehru makes for a very sad reading. Even the President of West Bengal Congress Committee, Atulya Ghosh felt that “it was amazing that no intimation was sent to his family members nor to his physician, B.C. Roy … the Kashmir Government appears to be callous … the way the news was conveyed to the house of Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee was highly objectionable.”
Though Syama Babu passed away on June 23, 1953, it was only on November 27, 1953, that a resolution was passed in the West Bengal Legislative Assembly to hold an inquiry into the causes and circumstances of his death. Gyanendra Kumar Chaudhary moved this resolution asking for the State Government to request the Central Government to hold an inquiry through a Commission with a judge of the Supreme Court of India as its Chairman. Another Assembly member from the Congress Party, Shankar Prasad Mitra, moved an amendment to the resolution seeking that the words “for holding an inquiry”, be substituted with “for requesting the Government of Jammu and Kashmir to hold an inquiry”. He also sought that the words “by appointing a Commission with the Judge of the Supreme Court of India to serve as Chairman of the Commission”, be omitted.
He emphasised that J&K enjoyed a special status. The executive powers of the Government of India extended to J&K only in respect of defence, external affairs and communication. The Government of India was therefore ‘incompetent’ to appoint a Commission of Inquiry which would function primarily within J&K. Government of India could only request or recommend to J&K that a Commission of Inquiry be appointed.
There were others like Sudhir Chandra Ray Choudhuri in the Legislative Assembly who actively opposed the amendment. Ray Choudhuri wondered why Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy, Chief Minister of West Bengal, had first thought an inquiry to be necessary and later declined it. He wanted to know the reason of this sudden change of heart. Syama Babu, after all, had been a great friend of Bidhan Babu. “Why should there be no move from the Chief Minister to induce the Government of India to hold an inquiry?”, he asked. He felt that the amendment would sidetrack the main issue. What was being asked for was an inquiry by the judge of a Supreme Court, a judge who could take cognizance of evidence anywhere, including J&K. In this particular instance, the J&K Government was the accused party. How could it then sit in judgment over this inquiry? Ray Choudhuri appealed to Bidhan Chandra Roy for an impartial inquiry by the Central Government.
Strangely, it was the members of the Congress Party who had argued in favour of the amendment. Even Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy said that, “barring the items like defence, external affairs and communication, the executive powers of the Government of India does not extend to J&K. Having recourse to the terms of the Constitution, there is no other alternative but to accept the amendment moved by Shri Shankar Prasad Mishra.” The Congress sought acceptance of the amendment and succeeded.
A resolution passed by the Assembly in West Bengal was forwarded to the Ministry of States in the section dealing with J&K. The Ministry of States acknowledged its receipt on 26th February 1954. The matter rested thereafter till the proceedings of the entire debate on the resolution was forwarded by West Bengal Government to the Ministry of States on 28th August 1954. The observation from the relevant files of the Ministry of States is as under:
“It is for consideration whether we may inform the Government of West Bengal that as the matter primarily concerns the Government of J&K, the Government of India did not consider it proper to pursue it. When the request for an inquiry into the circumstances of Syama Prasad Mukherjee’s death was raised in parliament, the attitude which he adopted was that this was a matter which concerned the Government of J&K alone. The resolution passed by the West Bengal Legislative Assembly is consistent with this stand since it only asks the Government of India to pass on the request to the J&K Government. We have now two course open. We may either send the copy of the resolution and proceedings to J&K Government for such action as they may consider necessary, or we may return the proceedings to the West Bengal Government and ask them to address the J&K Government directly. While the latter course may be strictly a correct one, it would have the effect of rebuff to the Government of West Bengal where Dr. Mukherjee’s death has agitated the public mind very much. There may, therefore, be no harm if we adopt the first alternative. I do not think this was likely to give rise to any misunderstanding with the J&K Government.” K.N.V. Nambisan from the Ministry of States signed this note on 7th September 1954. The first course was agreed upon by both, the Secretary and the Minister. On 22nd September, the Ministry of States forwarded the resolution to the Chief Secretary of J&K for such action as considered necessary. Nothing came out of this routine letter sent by the Ministry of States to the Government of J&K. No inquiry ensued.
In a starred parliamentary question, the Ministry of Home Affairs was asked to state whether the Chief Minister of West Bengal had visited J&K in June 1954 to enquire into the cause of Dr. Syama Prasad Mookerjee’s death. Also, whether the Chief Minister of West Bengal had submitted any report on this subject. The Speaker in the Lok Sabha was now to decide on the admissibility of the question. The Ministry of States asked the Chief Secretary of J&K about the reported visit of Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy. Later, the Ministry of States reverted to the Lok Sabha Secretariat that they had no information on this matter except for what had appeared in the newspaper about the stay of Dr. B.C. Roy in J&K. The letter further stated that the circumstances relating to the death of Syama Prasad Mukherjee in detention concerned J&K Government and not the Government of India and that the present question was outside the purview of the Government and therefore the question should not be admitted. The Printed List No. 21 of July 26, 1954 of Lok Sabha clearly displayed the starred question amongst the one which was disallowed.
On August 5, 1954, Ghulam Ahmed, Chief Secretary J&K, wrote to V. Narayanan, Joint Secretary in the Ministry of States, stating, “as you know Dr. B.C. Roy did come to Kashmir for a holiday and spent about a month here. He did see the bungalow where late Dr. Mukherjee was putting up, as well as the room in the hospital to which he had been removed prior to his death. Col. Sir Ram Nath Chopra, our Director, Health Services, took Dr. Roy to the hospital where he might have made some verbal inquiries on the spot. You will, therefore, see that no official inquiry was held by the doctor, and as such no report could have been submitted by him.”
Astonishingly, all three governments, of West Bengal, J&K and the Government of India had remained callously and deliberately indifferent in instituting a formal inquiry into the circumstances leading to the premature death of Dr. Syama Prasad Mukherjee, one of India’s tallest leaders.
(The author is a former Culture Secretary, Government of India and currently Sr Fellow at Vivekananda International Foundation, New Delhi.)
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