N. S. Gill who had joined the movement after the surrender of Singapore. Gill was a staff officer attached to the British Northern Command in Malaya and had retreated all the way down the Peninsula. His sudden switch-over to the Japanese camp seemed strange. He belonged to the arch-pro-British family of Sir Sunder Singh Majeethia of the Punjab which had provided five ADC's (aides-de-camp) to five successive British Commanders-in-Chief in India.
There were a few others from Hongkong, Shanghai, and other places. Burma and the Philippines were unable to send delegates as the "pacification" campaign in those countries was not yet complete.
The central figure at the Tokyo conference was Rash Behari Bose but whatever was achieved by the conference was due to the tireless efforts of one Mr. A. M. Nair. Nair-san, as he was called by everyone, was one of the most remarkable characters associated with the movement. He was the man behind Rash Behari Bose—and the man whom the Kudan Hills men sought to use as their "front".
As a youth of 20, Nair-san had come to Japan from his home in Trivandrum, in South India, to study civil engineering and graduated from Kyoto University some years later. But, instead of returning home to his engineering pursuits, he took to Japanese politics and became acquainted with veterans of the Black Dragon Society and other elements that advocated drastic action by Japan to crush Anglo-American influence and power on the Chinese mainland and elsewhere in Asia. For a time, Nair-san went about in Japan as a Ronin—the peculiar species of Japanese politician who professed no worldly ambition, who always remained poor and yet capable of raising enormous funds, who never sought office and yet commanded tremendous influence in the country, whose claim was that they never hurt anybody, though they would readily stoop to murder and arson in implementing their political projects.
From the Ronin's role, Nair-san switched over to some sort of undefined "political work"—in China, Manchuria, Mongolia, and Tibet. A man of dynamic energy, he had all sorts of adventures in the course of his unique assignment and had played many parts, ranging from camel dealer to Living Buddha. Prince Teh of Mongolia owed his contact with the Japanese to Nair and it was through him that the Japanese established liaison with many Chinese politicians. Officially, he was designated "Liaison Officer" at the conference headquarters but the delegates found him to be something of a mystery man, with a great deal of unseen power and influence.
The Japanese proposition was that Indians in East Asia should be organized as members of the Indian Independence League, which would devise and direct activities calculated to promote the cause of India's freedom, in collaboration with the Japanese Government and armed forces. There was agreement, in principle, but the men from Malaya, all lawyers, seemed eager to maintain democratic forms and suggested that such a vital decision should be taken at a really representative gathering of Indians in the region and with some specific understanding of the Japanese plans. They also submitted that it was highly important to regulate their activities on the general lines of policy followed by the leaders of Indian nationalism at home. They stressed that whatever they did in Southeast Asia should not conflict with the larger struggle inside India and the general policy of the Congress Party.
The Japanese Army officers, who conferred with the Indian delegates, recognized the difficulties confronting the overseas Indians. Democratic procedure, they agreed, was ideal but it would only lead to a lot of profitless talk and was, in any case, rather impracticable in wartime. Finally, the conference adopted a resolution to organize the Indian Independence League, with a central secretariat and branches all over East Asia. Rash Behari Bose was elected Interim President of the League and a scheme for setting up the organization was drafted. At the insistence of the Malayan delegates, it was resolved that the scheme should be implemented only after it was ratified by a larger conference attended by Indian representatives from all the East Asia territories. And Bangkok was chosen as the venue of the next big conference.
The Indian delegates left Tokyo, just about the time Sir Stafford Cripps returned from India. The Cripps plan was rejected by the Indian National Congress and other political organizations in India. The Cripps Mission did not break the Indian political deadlock but its failure did look like a blessing in disguise. For who knew whether Japan, in its triumphant march, would not have decided to have a crack at the British in India? Who knew whether General Tojo would not have said the word "go" to implement his threat of "great calamities" for India?
4
Destiny Obscure
MAESOD may not be on the map. It is a mean little village on the bank of a shallow creek that forms the boundary between Thailand and Burma in the mountainous hinterland east of the Dawna Ranges. It is less than 100 air miles from the port of Moulmein, where the Salween drains itself into the sea. But you must also reckon with the mountains, jungles, and rivers in between.
Maesod is the frontier post on the Thai side, a desolate little spot on the fringes of the jungle, with two rows of thatched huts along the main street and a few dilapidated buildings which house the government offices. It was in Maesod that my hurried trip from Bangkok came to an abrupt end. It was there that I spent the best part of the winter of 1941-42. And it was at this dreary jungle location that I witnessed one of the quaintest military campaigns of the century—Japan's bullock-cart invasion of Burma.
It was a slow train, packed to capacity. Most of the passengers were women and children, fleeing to the safety of their countryside homes, immediately after the Japanese forces began their occupation of the capital. A few Europeans, who tried to board the train, were promptly taken away by the Japanese military police at the Bangkok railway terminus. There were three of us in a corner of one of the compartments. And every time the train stopped at a wayside station, we feared that the end of our homeward journey was at hand.
The train was running behind time. We reached a place called Pitsanuloke, about 250 miles north of Bangkok, by midday. The next local train northward was a couple of hours later. We whiled away the time at a nearby Buddhist shrine. We thought it was safer than the waiting room at the station or the restaurant across the street. The idea was to get to the frontier and cross into Burma, without getting caught by the Japanese. We did not have the faintest idea that the Japanese were not treating Indians as enemy subjects. And it just did not occur to us that the frontier might be closed.
My companion on this fateful jaunt was Mr. S. A. Ayer, a veteran journalist, who had been in Bangkok for about a year as Reuters correspondent. He had waited, in vain, for instructions from his head office in London, without knowing that Thailand's communications with the outside world had been cut off, and finally decided on the flight to freedom. We were intimate friends, our personal problems were fairly identical, and each regarded the other as a source of strength and confidence. The third man on this race to the frontier was a native of Gorakhpur, in Northern India, who used to work as head watchman at one of the British banks in Bangkok. He decided to quit, after the Japanese sealed the bank and took away the British officers.
A few hours journey by train to Sawangaloke, followed by a hectic bus ride, took us to the tiny town of Raheng on the edge of the jungles and mountains. On the way, we passed the ancient city of Sukhothai, named after the birth place of the Lord Buddha in India, where everybody at the market place and the bus stand seemed excited over the outbreak of the war and yellow-robed Buddhist monks solemnly chanted hymns and prayed for the safety of Thailand and the Thai people.
Raheng, on the east bank of the Maeping River, was considered those days as the last outpost of civilization in central Thailand. The town was fast asleep by the time we staggered out of the rickety bus. The local Chinese hotel keeper, whom we woke up, refused to let us in until a Thai policeman on his beat intervened with the towkay (proprietor) on our behalf. But, once we were comfortably settled in the only room he kept for hire, readily accepting his terms, the towkay turned out to be one of the most helpful men in Raheng.
We explained our plans to him and insisted that we must start for Maesod early next morning.
