GUWAHATI, June 27 � The All India Legal Aid Forum has called upon the Central government to declassify 41 secret files pertaining to Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose so that the truth behind the fate of the national icon can be ascertained.
Addressing a press conference here today, the Forum�s general secretary and senior Supreme Court advocate Joydeep Mukherjee said that even after seven decades the country is not aware of the exact circumstances regarding the fate of Netaji after the alleged plane crash in Taiwan on August 18, 1945.
�From different files of the KGB, it is evidently clear that Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose was in Russia after August 18, 1945... Yet, our Central government is not officially writing to the Russian government for disclosure of the top secret files of the KGB. Unfortunately, the Centre has remained a silent spectator in the matter. Furthermore, it is keeping 41 files regarding Netaji as classified, top secret files,� he said.
Mukherjee said that various research scholars have accessed the KGB files from unofficial sources in Russia which state that Netaji had died in a jail in the Siberian city of Omsk.
The Forum demanded that all the 41 files should be declassified and the Centre should send a letter to the Russian government asking disclosure of the KGB files.
Besides, the Forum demanded that the contribution of the Azad Hind Fauj and Netaji in the freedom struggle should be properly mentioned in the school and college syllabi of the country and the Central government should also declare January 23 (Netaji�s birthday) as a National Holiday.
It also sought an investigation into the disappearance of the funds of the Indian National Army.
�A big bronze statue of Netaji and a memento in the memory of INA must be set up in front of the Red Fort in New Delhi by the Central government to give proper respect to the icon,� Mukherjee said.
The Forum will organise a rally from Moirang in Manipur to New Delhi in September as part of its campaign to force the government to come clean on the matter.
Similarly, the Forum also demanded disclosure of all details surrounding the deaths of Jan Sangh founder Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee and former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri.
