Subhas Chandra Bose: Can a Chinese angle solve Netaji mystry?

Kolkata: Deepening the mystery surrounding the disappearance of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, a new book claims the nationalist leader went to China after escaping into Russia. In his new book 'No Secrets' researcher Anuj Dhar says Netaji's elder brother and his closest associate Sarat Chandra Bose had written a front-page article in his newspaper 'The Nation' proclaiming that Netaji was in Red China in October 1949. A copy of the newspaper clipping is there in the book, which would be released next week in Kolkata, to support the claim. "It goes without saying that Sarat would not have published this in such a manner without being sure about it. The story quoted him claiming "that the Government of India was in possession of definite information that Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose was in Red China of Mao Tse-Tung". When asked why Subhas was not coming to India, Sarat Bose replied, "I don't think the time is ripe for his coming back home"," says the book. "It is a truth that in 1949 rumours began doing the rounds in India and elsewhere that Subhas Bose was in China. So much so that when pro-Soviet Bombay tabloid 'The Blitz' carried sensational news headlined "British report Bose alive in Red continent" on 26 March 1949, the American Consul there transmitted its text to the Secretary of State under the subject "Ghost of Subhas Chandra Bose". Written with the help of declassified and still secret records, the book says in 1956 Bose's associate Muthuramalingam Thevar had told newspapers such as 'Hindustan Standard' that he had secretly visited China on Sarat Bose's instruction.