BENGALURU: Investigative film Subhash Chandra Bose: The Mystery, to be broadcast on Discovery on Monday, will trace what happened to the controversial freedom fighter after his disappearance.
Some popular theories concieved over the past seven decades say Bose either died in a plane crash in Taipei or returned to India and lived the life of a wandering monk.
Iqbal Malhotra, the film’s producer-writer, says, “I wanted to pursue the subject because it remains one of the most controversial, unsolved mysteries of contemporary India.”
The film follows young NRI Sidhartha Satbhai, who commissioned Neil Millar, former veteran of the Royal Signals Regiment of the British Army, to conduct an image analysis on video and photographic material supplied by Internet group Anonymous.
The footage pertains to an individual referred to as ‘The Tashkent Man’, who was present during the Indo-Pak Tashkent Declaration of January 10, 1966.
Through modern scientific and facial analysis, the investigation points to the possibility of the bespectacled man being Netaji. It also infers that if Bose was present at the declaration, he could not have died in the plane crash on August 18, 1945, as officially reported.
The team wanted to present facts and perspectives on his disappearance, especially with the recently declassified Bose Papers now available.
Iqbal says, “We've explored the story in depth, with persistence, research and participation by individuals close to the subject.”
It has taken almost a year to stitch various fabrics of the mystery together. The team worked with with experts and scholars from France, Vietnam, Russia, UK and India. Among them, it features Dr Purabi Roy, author and visiting professor at Moscow State University, and Major General Alexandr Kolesnikov, Major General of the Warsaw Pact, who draw upon critical information from Russian archives regarding Bose’s presence in Post-World War II Russia.
Iqbal says some parts of the film have been dramatised by way of reenactments — Bose being declared dead at the Taihoku Field Hospital, Habibur Rahman’s conversation with Sarat Chandra Bose about his brother’s last moments after the plane crash and Leon Prouchandy’s detention.
Prouchandy, President of the Indian Independence League, was interrogated in Vietnam by those in power then, for information on the INA funds after Bose’s death or disappearance. However, the archival footage for these incidents are not available.
“In a dynamic world, with new opinions and facts emerging, there will always be alternative and opposing point-of-views,” he says. “Ours is a balanced story. It’s not sensational without substance.”
The team does not think its film narrative will shatter the aura around Bose. “Bose is a hero of contemporary India. The aura remains as strong as it ever was,” says Iqbal.
Subhash Chandra Bose: The Mystery, on Monday, at 9 pm, on Discovery Channel