Let no Indian patriot ignore Bose as an adventurer. His adventure can become India’s ruin. Let us set our own house in order before Bose sets it afir… - Puran Chand Joshi

P. C. Joshi wrote in People’s War dated July 18, 1943 : “ The Axis Radio reports that Bose is no more in Berlin but has reached Singapore. On July 6, Bose himself announced that he has been appointed the ‘Commander-inChief of ‘Indian Independence Army’ and is coming with the Jap invasion force. The arch-traitor to India’s freedom and independence calls upon Indian patriots to open a ‘Second Front’ against British, to intensify ‘struggle’ and start a ‘Revolution’ in India while he, the ‘Commander in-Chief with Tojo’s grace, marches in with Japanese invading forces to ‘liberate’ India. But his lieutenants here in India know that here is no ‘struggle’ to be intensified and so they are making a trial start for this game on August 9. Their programme for August 9 must be looked upon as a dress rehearsal for the ‘Revolution’ which has to be started when ‘Commander-in Chief Bose comes to liberate India with the Jap Army. It will be suicidal blindness to celebrate August 9 th as we do any protest anniversary, e.g. Jallianwalah Bagh Day. ”

We, therefore, quote from Joshi’s pamphlet. The Government circular stated: “ In the Party Congress held in Bombay from May 23 rd to June 1 st , 1943, there was an attack on the negative policy of the Congress and the resolution openly identified for the first time the Congress Socialists and Forward Bloc with the fifth-column elements who are accused of taking advantage of the Congress resolution of August 1942 to lead the country to the brink of disaster. Not only are the Communists almost the only Party which fought for victory; they alone have criticised the Congress defeatism from a political point of view as opposed, for instance, to the fundamentally communal criticism of the Congress policy by the Muslim League etc., and have openly attacked as traitors the off-shoots of Congress, the Forward Bloc and the Congress Socialists Party.

Hitler’s aggression against the USSR immediately upset the balance of forces in the Allied camp; the isolation of the Soviet Union was replaced by the Anglo-Soviet and the American-Soviet alliance (p. 42).