A 35-year-old woman, claiming to be an office-bearer of Bharatiya Subhash Sena (BSS), a registered but unrecognised political party, raised many eyebrows in the Madras High Court Bench here on Tuesday by claiming that Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose was still alive and that he could be produced in court if the Centre would not treat him as a war criminal.
She made the submission in an affidavit filed before Justice M. Venugopal in support of a writ petition instituted by V. Ramesh, an advocate based here, seeking a direction to the Union Cabinet Secretary to declassify 39 out of 41 official documents that could unravel the mystery behind the death of the leader of the Indian National Army during the pre-Independence era.
Submitting the supporting affidavit of A. Alagu Meena, who claimed to be filing it in the capacity of State organiser of the BSS, the writ petitioner’s counsel W. Peter Ramesh Kumar contended that the stand taken by her had strengthened his claim of several contradictory theories being floated behind Netaji’s mysterious disappearance in 1945.
Counter by January 5After hearing him, the judge directed Assistant Solicitor General G.R. Swaminathan to make sure that the Cabinet Secretary files his counter affidavit by January 5 and adjourned the hearing.