JOIN USNetaji's daughter says his remains should be brought back to India
Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose's daughter Anita Bose Pfaff on Monday said that the time has come to bring back his remains to India from Japan and suggested that DNA testing could be done to clear doubts of those who do not believe that he died 77 years ago.
Pfaff, an Austrian-born economist living in Germany, said in a statement that she felt obliged as Netaji's "only child" to ensure that his "dearest wish" to return to his country in freedom be fulfilled by bringing his remains back and honouring him with appropriate ceremonies.
She said that even after 75 years of India throwing off the shackles of colonial rule, one of the most prominent heroes of the independence struggle had not returned to his motherland.
"Nothing in his life was more important to Netaji than his country’s independence. There was nothing that he longed for more than living in an India, free of foreign rule! Since he did not live to experience the joy of freedom, it is time that at least his remains can return to Indian soil," she said.
Referring to Netaji's followers who still do not believe that he did not die on 18 August, 1945, she said now one has access to the originally classified inquiries of 1945 and 1946, which showed he died in a foreign country on that day.
She said Japan has provided a ‘temporary’ home to his remains at Renkoji Temple in Tokyo, which have been cared for and honoured by three generations of priests. Many Indians, including most of her Prime Ministers, have paid homage to Netaji and the INA there, she said.
"Modern technology now offers the means for sophisticated DNA-testing, provided DNA can be extracted from the remains. To those who still doubt that Netaji died on 18 August, 1945, it offers a chance to obtain scientific proof that the remains kept at Renkoji Temple in Tokyo are his," she said.
The priest of Renkoji Temple and the Japanese government agreed to such a test, as the documents in the annexures of the Justice M K Mukherjee Commission of Inquiry, the last Indian governmental investigation into Netaji’s death, show. "So let us finally prepare to bring him home," she said.
Two commissions of inquiry had concluded that Netaji had died in a plane crash in Taipei on 18 August, 1945 but Justice M K Mukherjee had suggested that he was alive after that.
Pfaff also said that "all Indians, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis, who can now live in freedom, constitute Netaji's family! I salute you all as my brothers and my sisters! And I invite you to support my efforts to bring Netaji home!"