Subhash Chandra Bose was elected Congress President in 1939 for a second term, defeating Gandhiji’s candidate Pattabhi Sitaramayya. When Gandhiji said, ‘Pattabhi’s defeat is my defeat,’ Bose resigned.  The same Gandhiji, in 1942 called Subhash Chandra Bose the "Prince among the Patriots" for his great love for the country. I revere Subhash Chandra Bose as one of the greatest patriots and freedom fighters the country has ever produced.

However his alleged death in a plane crash in Taiwan on August 18, 1945, has long been the subject of dispute. In  1956, the Jawaharlal Nehru Government formed a committee headed by Shah Nawaz Khan. Pasum Pon Muthuramalinga Thevar was the first person to depose before the Committee. Thevar was convinced that the committee was unlikely to do justice. On April 3, 1956, he told a press conference in Delhi that the committee was "an eyewash" and that he would furnish "conclusive proof that Bose was alive "if the committee was reconstituted".  Thevar said he had met Bose in China in 1950. This was reported by several newspapers.

In 1970 the Government of India formed a judicial commission headed by Justice GD Khosla. This Commission also stated that Bose had died in Taiwan. On August 28, 1978 Prime Minister Morarji Desai said that there were "various important contradictions in the testimony of the (mostly Japanese) witnesses" to Bose's death. And that "some further contemporary official documentary records have also become available", making the Government of India think that the conclusions reached by GD Khosla and Shah Nawaz Khan were not "decisive."  

In 1999, following a court order, the Government of India appointed the Mukherjee Commission of Inquiry. Overturning the findings of previous panels, this commission's findings were that the news of Bose's death in Taipei was a cover-up for his escape to the USSR.

Chandrachur Ghose, an executive with a private firm, filed an RTI application with the Central Information Commission seeking disclosure of exhibits listed in the Justice Mukherjee Commission report. The Union Home Ministry, during the hearing at CIC last month had said the ministry had no problem in disclosing the documents pertaining to it, but it was not possible to provide papers of other ministries, PMO and some state governments mentioned in the report as they wanted their records back.

The CIC, yesterday directed the Home Ministry to make public "each" exhibit listed in the Justice Mukherjee Commission report which probed the alleged disappearance of Subhash Chandra Bose in 1945, even if they belonged to other ministries and state governments. "The orders of Ministry of Home Affairs withholding part of information sought are set aside, a copy of each exhibit sought by the appellant ... will be provided to him within 20 working days of the date of receipt of this decision notice," Chief Information Commissioner Wajahat Habibullah said.

Let us hope Chandrachur Ghose would be able to throw fresh light on this issue.