A World View on The Netaji

Political lineage of Subhas Chandra Bose turned out to be a burden for INA veterans n his assessment of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, Ram Manohar Lohia describes Bose as the embodiment of the Haldighati spirit. Drawing an analogy with Rana Pratap's refusal to accept defeat to the Mughal army, Lohia says Bose accepted neither defeat nor the withdrawal of lassitude. The Haldighati spirit does not believe the world will end with the current generation. It believes that the ultimate source of strength and goodness lies in the power of the will. But, Lohia writes, how clean, knowing , unselfish and undefeated is this spirit? This description also fits the action-packed life of Bose's close associate in the Indian National Army (INA), Captain Lakshmi Sahgal , who passed away at the age of 97 in Kanpur recently. Even her last act - to donate her eyes to a needy person and her body to medical students - reflected a radical edge undiminished by age. But how appreciative was...

Dr Laxmi Sehgal - Commander of INA Fauj - Jhasi regiment passes away at 97 today only to make us wonder what the honour and respect the nation's new rulers have had bestowed on her. Her name is now the epitome of medical service.Tlll her last days she was serving and treating her poor patients.The nation could not honour her beyond a Padmabibhusan. The ruling NDA though was supportive of INA movement but Laxmi Sehgal's presidency candidature on behalf of Communist lobby of India did not go well with the NDA who had the maximum votes in their bag and lost it miserably not for her fault but for lack of gratitude of the power loving Indians at the corridors of legislature. “The fight will go on,” said Captain Lakshmi Sahgal one day in 2006, sitting in her crowded Kanpur clinic where, at 92, she still saw patients every morning. She was speaking on camera to Singeli Agnew, a young filmmaker from the Graduate School of Journalism, Berkeley, who was making a documentary on her l...