Message from Dr. Sisir Kumar Bose

"Where are those high-souled seers today? Do we hear their prayers any more? There is no more of their yoga, their prayers, their worship, etc…. We have lost our religion, and everything else…even our national life.

"Will not any son of Mother India in distress, in total disregard of his selfish interests, dedicate his whole life to the cause of the Mother? …We must now shake off our stupor and lethargy and plunge into action…." Thus wrote Subhas Chandra Bose to his mother when he was a boy of fourteen.

Even before he reached adolescence, Subhas Chandra accepted the land of his birth as the Holy Land despite its present degradation, worshipped India as the Mother Divine from day to day, completely prepared to sacrifice his all, even life itself, for her deliverance. He found his '_Swadharma" in '_Karma" and plunged into a life of ceaseless activity and struggle.

But, the indefatigable warrior did pause from time to time for prayer and meditation without ever making any demonstration of them. He returned from his meditation with renewed mental strength and determination and resumed his struggle.

The India that we have today is not the India that Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose worked, fought battles across the world and sacrificed his life for. For their own sake and for the emancipation of the land of their birth, Indians must re-discover Subhas Chandra Bose. Netaji's Book of Life must become their gospel. As he has said in his Political Testament: "…no suffering, no sacrifice is ever futile. It is through suffering and sacrifice alone that a cause can flourish and prosper and in every age and clime the eternal law prevails — 'the blood of the martyr is the seed of the church.' …One individual may die for an idea but that idea will, after his death, reincarnate itself in a thousand lives…."

Sisir Kumar Bose

Calcutta, India

18 December 1996