Road to Delhi. M. Sivaram
China in its anti-Japanese resistance. Chinese businessmen had organized large scale anti-Japanese boycotts and many Chinese leaders in Southeast Asia figured in the "black lists" maintained by the Japanese militarists. It was only through brute force that the Japanese succeeded in getting overseas Chinese communities to the point of tolerantly listening to the slogans of Asian liberation.
The Chinese genius for adjustment in the game of self-preservation, however, often proved superior to the ruthlessness of the Japanese demand for conformity. Many well-to-do Chinese in Malaya and elsewhere affixed a portrait of Wang Ching-wei behind the massive frame which held the portrait of Chiang Kai-shek. Wang was on display, in all prominence, in the drawing room when the Japanese were around, while a quick turn of the frame brought back Chiang's portrait on the wall, as soon as the Japanese left the place.
The people of Indochina were not unduly impressed by Japan's doctrine of Asian liberation. They wondered why it was not applied to them when the Japanese army forced the French into the background and assumed control over their country. The Filipinos, who were already on the threshold of freedom at that time, were equally unenthusiastic about the pledge of "liberation" by the Japanese. The Malays, Javanese, and others, until then under British or Dutch colonial rule, were indifferent to the strange combination of unabashed oppression and condescending affection with which their Japanese liberators dealt with them. These innocent millions had seen both these tactics, as practiced by their colonial masters, though under more congenial surroundings.
It was among the freedom-hungry Indians and Burmese that the initial phase of the Greater East Asia War created a more profound impression. To them, the appeal to freedom proved magnetic, in spite of the vague suspicion that there was something false about the appeal. In Burma, there was a large faction of young nationalists who welcomed the Japanese assault on British power and actively helped Japanese armed forces at the initial phase of the campaign. In India, Japan's War of Greater East Asia brought fresh hopes and fears—hopes of the possibility of Britain revising its attitude towards Indian nationalist aspirations, and fear of the destruction and chaos that would result in the event of India becoming a battleground between British and Japanese forces.
Meanwhile, the Japanese combined all their skill and resourcefulness—goodwill and cajolery, bribery and corruption, threat and terrorism—for the mobilization of what was probably the most astounding political and propaganda campaign by any power. And that in the blessed name of freedom and humanity and the sacred cause of the liberation of hundreds of millions of oppressed Asians!
Japan's fifth-column had been active in Burma, Malaya, Thailand, and the string of islands, large and small, that made up the former Netherlands East Indies. Japanese agents were scattered all over Southeast Asia in the guise of dentists, barbers, tailors, photographers, small-time traders, traveling salesmen, wandering newsmen, and goodwill tourists. On December 8, all these seemingly innocent people came out in their true color. With them were disclosed many of the local hands who worked for the Japanese spy ring at various places. Most of them, however, were obscure men who suddenly started parading their political foresight and pan-Asian spirit, once they felt sure of their safety.
No nationality was left unexploited by the Japanese fifth-columnists, but it seemed that it was among Indians that they were least successful. No Indian public figure of any consequence anywhere in East Asia was known to have been in league with the Japanese before the outbreak of war, with the result that the Japanese had to be content with men of mediocre ability, who lent their services mainly for the profit derived from the deal. Yet, in a few months after the war broke out, almost every Indian in East Asia became involved in Japan's great game of the liberation of India.
There was good reason why the Japanese failed to win influential Indians among their sympathizers. India was already engaged in a struggle against British imperialist rule. The Indian National Congress, which led this struggle, had always supported China in its resistance against Japan. This attitude of India's premier political party had its influence on the large Indian population throughout Southeast Asia. Besides, the Japanese might have found it difficult to secure the support of the better known Indians in Malaya and Burma, where the British authorities maintained strict vigil against all alien elements.
Sprawled all over Southeast Asia were nearly two million Indians, subjects of Japan's British enemy. The problem of these Indian immigrants was different from that of the Malays, Javanese, Burmese, Filipinos, and others whose countries were being overrun by the Japanese forces. Besides the two million Indians, mostly laborers and merchants and a small sprinkling of the professional classes, there were about 80,000 Indian troops and officers in Malaya and Singapore and probably half that number in Burma.
The small Indian community in Tokyo was assured on the afternoon of December 8 that no harm would come to them, that Japan's war was only against the British, not their Asian subjects. In Bangkok, while the Japanese forces were encircling the British and American legations, raiding British and American business firms, and rounding up all the Britons and Americans, Indians were wondering what would happen to them. Only a very few like me thought of getting away, without realizing that running for the frontier was an extremely risky game. The next day, however, the issue was clarified. Indians were not interned; the British were. In Hongkong, Malaya, Burma, and elsewhere Indians were treated with special consideration.
It was incredible—Indians being treated with special consideration and respect, while Britons were dragged out of their homes and offices and driven to prison camps; the Indian coolie going about free while the British Tuan Besar (Big Master) was slapped in the face; Indian second lieutenants and havildars (non-commissioned officers) of the British Army invited to share the Japanese commander's jeep, while British captains and colonels were herded together and marched off to concentration camps by Japanese corporals. It seemed the colored man —black, brown, and yellow—had come into his own. It seemed the Indian, hitherto a fourth-rater among foreigners in any country, had become equal to the best among first-raters!
As the Japanese Army smashed its way down the Malay Peninsula, the status and prestige of the Indian population went up steadily. Indian troops laid down arms and, in many sectors, actively joined the Japanese in the campaign against the British. Indian communities welcomed the Japanese troops, particularly when they felt sure that it was the best method of ensuring their safety. Indian laborers helped the Japanese army engineering corps in the work of repair and reconstruction. It looked as if Indians were granted a special lease of freedom and respectful consideration in Southeast Asia which was being mauled by the Japanese juggernaut.
All along the bloody trail of the advancing Japanese forces down the Malay Peninsula, the Sikh soldier's soiled turban, the Tamil coolie's dirty dhoti and the dark-brownish face of the kerala krani (white-collar worker) became objects of special consideration, while a sari, hung up along the veranda for drying in the sun, suddenly blazoned safety for any household.
All this miracle was the work of the mystery men on Kudan Hills. They had already interested themselves in the Indian problem. Until December 8, the Japanese had worked with the help of a few ordinary agents and their main activity was among the Indian troops in Malaya. The Japanese dropped a variety of leaflets behind the British lines, appealing to the Indian troops to shoot down the British officers and surrender to the Japanese. They also used a few Indian agents to address the Indian troops over the field microphones, urging them not to fight and die for the British.
This party of Indian agents of the Japanese was headed by Pritam Singh, who was once a teacher at the Sikh temple in Bangkok. Giani Pritam Singh, as he was called, had a band of dare-devils who braved the hazards of the battlefronts in Malaya in the bid to win the Indian Army for the Japanese. They claimed they were doing propaganda and were proud of their achievement. Many of them did not know precisely what they were doing, though they claimed they were engaged in revolutionary work which made them rich and powerful.
After Japan had let loose the maelstrom, the Kudan Hills tacticians got down to the business of tackling the Indian problem on more respectable lines. On December 9, the day after the war broke out, the late Rash Behari Bose received a telephone call from the 8th section, 2nd Bureau of the Imperial General Staff. The man who spoke for the General Staff was Major Ozeki, one of the brightest among Doihara's disciples. Rash Behari Bose was invited to the Imperial General