Gumnami Baba was Bose, says Justice Sahai Commission report

Lucknow: The Justice Vishnu Sahai Commission, set up in June last year to probe the identity of Gumnami Baba, widely believed to Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, has said that majority of the witnesses believed him to be Bose.

The Justice Sahai commission was instituted on the directive of the Allahabad high court which acted on a PIL where the petitioner claimed that the reclusive Gumnami Baba was actually Subhash Chandra Bose.

Justice Sahai has now submitted his report to Governor Ram Naik.

Justice Sahai said, “The primary sources of evidence for the commission were the witnesses who either appeared before me in person or whose affidavits were treated by me as statements. A majority of the witnesses said Gumnami Baba was Netaji or may have been Netaji. Some witnesses also said he was not Netaji”.

Though Justice Sahai did not reveal the findings, he said that in his 347 page report, the biggest challenge was the passage of time between Gumnami Baba’s death and the hearing of the commission.

“Gumnami Baba died in 1985 and witnesses gave their statements in 2016 and 2017, a time gap of almost three decades. It is natural that with passage of time, their memory dimmed and, at times, they were prone to imagine facts and events, about which they deposed”, he said.

The Sahai Commission looked into the belonging of Gumnami Baba that had been found after his demise. Among the belongings were some maps belonging to the pre-Independence era and other items like pens that people insisted belonged to Bose.

“The mandate of the commission was to find out the identity of Gumnami Baba. Majority of the witnesses began with the premise that Gumnami Baba was indeed Netaji. Their approach was that, in case the commission did not agree with their premise, only then should it try to find out the identity of Gumnami Baba. In other words, they put the cart before the horse”, he added.