TMC didn’t ask me to join: Chandra Bose

On January 23, Chandra Bose had attended the ceremony in New Delhi when 100 files on Netaji were declassified by PM Narendra Modi. Responding to queries on why he did not join Trinamul Congress, which was the first to declassify 64 secret files on Netaji, Mr Bose said: “The Congress has been totally non-transparent. They have suppressed facts not only about Subhas Bose but about many other freedom fighters. As far as the TMC is concerned, they did not ask me to join. Moreover, I am not too happy with the governance of the party.”

He is the second person from the Bose family to join the BJP. “My father Amiya Nath Bose was vice-president of the BJP. He was closely associated with former PM A.B. Vajpayee,” he said. His decision to formally join the BJP just months before the Assembly polls sparked speculation about his possible nomination. “It is premature to comment on that as I have just joined the party. I would leave it to my party to decide whether I would contest the elections,” he said.

The state BJP is planning to use this scion of the Netaji family extensively during the poll campaign. Unlike TMC MP Sugata Bose, Chandra Bose does not accept that Netaji was killed in a plane crash in 1945.