By Newsgram Staff Writer

Two declassified Intelligence Bureau (IB) files have reportedly revealed that the government under India's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru spied on the family of Subhas Chandra Bose for nearly 20 years.

"The files show the IB resumed British-era surveillance on the two Bose family homes in Calcutta: 1 Woodburn Park and 38/2 Elgin Road. Apart from intercepting and copying letters written by Bose's family members, agency sleuths shadowed them on their domestic and foreign travels," said the report.

Surveillance was also reportedly conducted on Bose's nephews Sisir Kumar Bose and Amiya Nath Bose.
BJP national spokesperson MJ Akbar was quoted in the report as alleging that the spying was done because Congress was scared of Bose's return and felt he was the only leader who could mobilise the opposition against the Congress in the 1957 polls.

While Bose's only daughter, 73-year-old Anita Bose-Pfaff, said she was not too surprised to hear about the surveillance, Chandra Kumar Bose, Netaji's grand-nephew, told a news channel that a judicial inquiry should be conducted into this issue.

"That is the least that India can do today for him (Bose)," he said.

While under house arrest by the British in then Calcutta, Netaji had escaped in 1941 to seek international support for his efforts to free India and formed the Indian National Army with the help of the Japanese. He went missing in 1945 and since then little has been known about his whereabouts.