a_f_d

Hi Bipat, nice to have you back on the forum (didn't think you'd be able to resist ).
...
# soldiers, yes - there were, at the very least, 10 Indians in the British Army for every one that joined Chandra Bose.
# taxes - who was being taxed? (and before you mention it, salt tax was, realistically, never collected - just another of MKG's clever PR jobs).
# grain - UK was certainly short of grain, and was importing a lot from America under the deplorable lend-lease scheme. India's food-grain problems at that time were to a significant extent due to loss of imports, mainly from Australia and Chandra Bose's stamping ground Burma.
# At the end of WWII Britain was out of all resources, exhausted, broke and in hock to Uncle Sam, and the population was almost verging on malnourished (not starving but very poorly fed). There was neither the energy nor inclination to bother about 'the Empire' in general or India in particular (anyway, as I said in my old post, Churchill had parleyed it away).
# If Chandra Bose had survived he would have been hanged (maybe was, by someone, someplace).

AndyD 8-)₹

Bipat

Andy--Taxes --read up The Empire history. Salt-- it was a law against the producers selling their own salt, yes Gandhi got the law dropped. It only affected coastal people but many with a small patch of land it was important. Our family had/still have salt pans run by a cooperative now. At that time being relatively 'well-off' the law didn't matter that much to them, but income lost was enough to starve a poor person. You might want to read about the 1943 Bengal famine. Chandra Bose--I think the question was/is what was Nehru's hand if any, in his end? Unlikely any one will ever know? All the papers are not being released.All history now. Present relations good between UK and India. Was improving with Pakistan between the two PMs, then look what happened --see news regarding todays attack.

scot47

Few people seem to have heard of the Bengal Famine of 1943.

a_f_d

Sound familiar?

AndyD 8-)₹

Bipat

You can believe what you want to believe. The British were rulers. It has been described by some as genocide by Churchill.
There is a recent article in the Independent "Not His Finest Hour"--I can't get a link.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengal_famine_of_1943

There were many great famines during British rule, millions and millions died. Since independence obviously weather conditions have been the same with the usual droughts, and hunger etc. but no great famines.

You have to ask yourself Andy, why were the British there, charity?? or their own purposes.
Anyway now it is history, and governments are different.

Bipat

Latest documents. U.K. website releases eyewitness accounts of Netaji plane crash - The Hindu

scot47

I find it hard to credit the theories that Bose survived the crash or that there is some conspiracy here.On the end-phase of the war in the Raj -

Bipat

Not sure what you mean by "war in the Raj"?? Of course the aim was to get rid of the occupying British. Those that were there at the time tell me/have told me, Chandra Bose was for any means, Nehru and Gandhi peaceful means. But Nehru was absolutely keen for power himself and to be the first PM; the question that will never be answered is did he have any hand in the 'end' of Chandra Bose? Personally can't help thinking peaceful way was best!!

kimilseung

Not necessarily surviving a crash, the question I come across most, is, was there a crash. It is alleged that there is no record of a crash on that day in Taiwan.
I kind of think of it as a safe conspiracy theory. I can allow myself to be intrigued, without it really affecting me day to day.

scot47

By "War in the Raj" I mean simply the period in and after WW2 as it affected India. A small part of the Raj was occupied and Bose set up a government on the Andaman islands

Bipat

India being such a vast country difficult to know how much it affected the ordinary people in general. There was food rationing and of course more soldiers recruited.
OH as a child in a coastal town remembers -the rationing---"went on for years",--more soldiers than usual about, a contingent stationed there and flat bottomed boats coming to land on their beach.

Seen a new book advertised--The Raj at War -- A People's History of India's Second World War by Yasmin Khan. Published 2015.

scot47

India social storm over fake Nehru 'letter' on Subhas Chandra Bose - BBC News

Bipat

Those old enough to remember say that there was always a rumour that Nehru may have had a hand in the 'end' of Chandra Bose, after all they were rivals!
However just rumours nothing more..
Very little in TimesOI about the published papers, but an entire page in Deccan Herald
(I didn't read it!! had enough of all the stuff on TIO

100 files relating to Netaji Subhash Bose declassified by PM