Kolkata: According to grandnephew Chandra Kumar Bose, Subhas Chandra Bose’s iconic cap, which had been handed over to the Prime Minister during the inauguration of a museum dedicated to him at Delhi’s Red Fort, had gone missing.
Elaborating, Chandra Bose told the FPJ that without anyone's permission and without drawing the Prime Minister's attention to the matter, the cap has been sent to a museum in Kolkata’s Victoria Memorial Hall. ''But this was not the place it was meant to be at.''
A distressed Bose tagged Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a tweet which said it was unfair that a personal attire of the freedom fighter was being shunted from one place to the other.
“Netaji didn’t say ‘Chalo Calcutta’, but despite that the Union Cultural Ministry sent the cap to Kolkata during the 125th birth anniversary celebrations. If more museums open across the country and the cap travels to every state then it will surely lose its sheen,” stated the grandnephew.
Sources in the Culture Ministry and the Archaeological Survey of India told CNN-News18, which broke the story, that the said cap was moved to Kolkata’s Victoria Memorial this year in January where the event to mark the 125th birth anniversary of Netaji was held in the presence of Modi and Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee.
According to these sources, the cap was loaned to Victoria Memorial for a period of six months starting January and Chandra Kumar Bose and the leader’s family had been aware of the developments.
From that stems a contrarian viewpoint that it was an attempt by Chandra Bose to stoke an unnecessary controversy and drag the name of the Prime Minister into the matter, as it would then get considerable traction.
Officials from Victoria Memorial admit that many items were loaned by the ASI for the programme. Not just his cap but other items, including weapons used by Netaji, were displayed at the exhibition, where the entire Bose family was invited.
