In her speech to mark the 128th birth anniversary of Subhash Chandra Bose on January 23, Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee once again demanded that the Union government immediately declassify all the files related to him which are kept in its archives.

She reminded the government that she had declassified all the 64 files related to him kept in the state archives.

She has been demanding the declassification of the Netaji files held at the central archives ever since she did the same for the files held at the state archives (55 with the Kolkata Police, nine with the state police) on September 18, 2015. These are on public view at the Police Museum in Kolkata.

She said that “Netaji Subhas Chandra was a victim of conspiracy” and she feels sad that “we do not even know what actually happened to Netaji”.

Banerjee was speaking at a programme organised on the freedom fighter’s birth anniversary in Alipurduar district. She also demanded the declaration of Netaji’s birthday as a national holiday (it is a state holiday).

While the Union government contends that it has declassified all the files it held (it released a third batch of declassified files in April 2016, covering the period between 1956 and 2009), a section of researchers strongly believes that the Intelligence Bureau files on the matter are still not in the public domain.

Interestingly, in 2017, in response to a query under the Right to Information Act, the government had confirmed that Subhas Chandra Bose died in a plane crash in Taipei on August 18, 1945.

“Bose was a true leader and pathfinder. He was the founder of the Indian National Army. … The former Planning Commission was also Bose’s brainchild. … Bose was such a visionary who believed in the unity of all religions,” said the chief minister at the function in Alipurduar district.