Indian National Army - Controversies

Controversies

A number of different views and controversies surround the history and records of the Indian National Army, borne especially by its integral associations with Imperial Japan, and the course and history of Japanese occupation of South-East Asia during the War. These include views especially among British troops that the recruits were traitors, that they were Axis Collaborators, as well as allegations that INA troops engaged in or were complicit in widespread torture of Allied and Indian prisoners of war. Fay concludes in his 1993 history of the army that the allegations were largely products of the British propaganda campaign and points out that the allegations were not borne out by the charges against the defendants in the Red Fort trials. Fay also points out that war-time press releases as well as the field counter-intelligence directed at the sepoy portrayed the INA as a small group and attributes to the Jiffs campaign the promalgamation of the view that INA recruits were weak-willed and traitorous Axis collaborators motivated by selfish interests of greed and personal gain. He further notes over the records of Shah Nawaz Khan's trial that officers of the INA had described to their men the possibility of having to fight the Japanese after having fought the British in order to prevent Japan from exploiting India.

Controversy also exists in India with regards to the treatment of the ex-INA soldiers by the post-independence government of India and of historical records of the period leading up to Indian independence in 1947, with some alleging that official histories of the independence movement largely omit events surrounding the INA especially the Red Fort trials and the Bombay Mutiny and ignore their significance in terms of rejuvenation of the independence movement and guiding the British decision to relinquish the Raj. Further criticisms have been made in recent years for the general hardships and apathy surrounding the conditions of ex-INA troops including, for example, the circumstances surrounding the death and funeral of Ram Singh Thakur. These have been compounded by a number of conspiracy-theories and news reports in the past on agreements between the Indian political leadership to hand over its leader Subhas Chandra Bose as a War Criminal if he was found to be alive. Later historians have, however, argued that given the political aim and nature of the entire Azad Hind movement especially the Indian National Army, Nehru's decisions may have been to prevent politicisation of the army and assert civilian authority over the military.