Subhash Chandra Bose was born in 1897 in Cuttack, where his family lived. He had his education in Kolkata. He went to England in 1919, and appeared at the I.C.S. examination, as desired by his father. He came ‘Fourth’ among the successful candidates. But he did not want to serve the British Government.
Bose returned to India, and joined the Indian National Congress for freedom movement. He became the president of the Congress Party. He was arrested and jailed several times, as a prominent national leader.
Later on, he left Congress owing to his difference of opinion with Gandhiji, and formed a new party called ‘Forward Block'<|
During World War-II in 1941, Bose I escaped in the disguise of a Maulvi, and reached Germany under an Italian diplomatic passport with an Italian name of Orlando Mazotta.
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In Berlin, he formed the first Indian National Army (I.N.A.) with the ‘prisoners of war’, who were Indian soldiers serving the British Army. Now he came to be called ‘Netaji’ by the new Indian army.
Netaji founded in Berlin an Indian radio station called ‘Azad Hind Radio’, from where he had been broadcasting regularly his views and suggestions for the guidance of his countrymen during the war.
After some time, he shifted his headquarters to Japan with his army, and the I.N.A. soon took the shape of a large army there with the help of another local nationalist named Ras Bihari Bose, who also escaped long ago, and took shelter in Japan to evade punishment as a militant nationalist at the hands of the British Government for attempting to the Viceroy of India.
Netaji, the chief commander of the I.N.A. soldiers, fought bravely in the Burma Front, and hoisted Indian National Flag in Impala of Manipur. But as the allied Japanese force had suddenly surrendered to the enemies, Netaji had to order for retreat of his soldiers.
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Then, Netaji decided to go to Russia in a Japanese aircraft that met with an accident.