deserts of North Africa, in Italy and
Greece, and on the high seas in
the Mediterranean, developed in
them a sense of pride and self
confidence.
Did they really face death for
the pittance they got as their
monthly wages? The British
cleverly exploited the latent national
pride of the Indian soldiers to
inspire them to give of their best in
battle. It was the Maratha, the
Rajput, the Pujabi, the Jath, each
fought to uphold his national
tradition. When we entered the
more politically alive area of
Central Burma, in the summer of
1945, we were greeted as
liberators. This had been the
experience of the Indian soldiers in
Italy and Greece, and later in Indo-
China, Malaya and Indonesia. In
Iran, he had come in contact with
the Red Army. This was a
bewildering experience for the
Indian peasant in uniform. How
could he, who was not free himself,
liberate others? Was it then true that
he was really fighting a war of
liberation? Would India be free at
the end of the war? All these
questions were more vital for the
educated young technician, the
factory worker, the poor peasant
who had witnessed or even
participated in some form or other
in a class struggle or a political
movement.
Then the tide turned. In Greece,
Burma, Indo-China, Malaya and
Indonesia, the Indian soldier
suddenly found himself ranged
against those very people who had
welcomed him as a liberator. In
Saigon he was asked to fight
alongside his erstwhile enemy, the
Japanese soldier, against the civil
population. He expressed his
resentment openly. “Soldiers are
not meant to fight civilians”, he said.
“They have committed no crime,
they want freedom. Was not this
war fought for the freedom of all
peoples?” The Gurkhas were
brought in and the Indians kept
12
away from actions against the
Vietnamese urban guerrillas.
In the meantime there had
been disturbances within the Indian
armed forces in India. In the early
years of the war, 114 members of
the 21 st Indian Cavalry refused to
go abroad to fight an imperialist
war. Four were hanged and the rest
imprisoned. In 1942, in the wake
of the August movement, there
were many actions by Indian
soldiers which were ruthlessly
suppressed. Between March 1942
and April 1945 there were 19
mutinies in the Royal Indian Navy
alone. These related to various
grievances including racial
discrimination. In 1944, nearly 400
soldiers of the Indian Railway
Maintenance Company mutinied
against unjust disciplinary
measures. Contacted by sources
of the Indian National Army there
was an attempted mutiny in a
coastal battery on the eastern
coast. All these were drowned in
blood; the news carefully hidden
from the public. The socialists were
often involved.
In Burma the Indian soldier
also met his compatriots from the
Indian National Army. He could not
really accept them as his enemy. It
was a confusing experience. Many
of the INA sincerely believed that
they had been fighting a war of
liberation with the help of the
Japanese. At the same time they
too had began to realize that the
Japanese had treated them no
better that the British, using them
as expendable cannon fodder.
Where lay the truth of the fight for
freedom and foreign domination?
These multi-faceted and often
contradictory experiences gave
birth to a ferment that passed
unnoticed outside the Indian armed
forces. There was a search for a
new identity. Were they merce-
naries or were they nationalists?
The INA had participated in a
liberation struggle. Yet, they, who
were slaves, had been welcomed
as liberators in the very countries
where the INA too had fought. Now
the slaves who had become
liberators wanted to participate in
the liberation struggle of their own
homeland.
As the Indian soldiers made
their war-weary way home they
wondered; would the national and
revolutionary leadership of the
country come forward to give them
the necessary guidance? This was
the question uppermost in their
minds. This vital question remained
unanswered.
They returned to an India
seething with discontent. The
Congress promptly came out in
support of the spontaneous
political mobilization of the masses
in the struggle for the release of
the INA leaders. The non-violent
leadership of the national move-
ment condoned and absorbed a
violent and anti-imperialist struggle
by a section of the armed forces.
Some “innocents” in the services
were foolish enough to believe that
if they too struck against the
common enemy, the national
leadership would stand by them.
The situation was indeed ripe for a
national revolt of an unprecedented
magnitude. The memories of the
series of militant peasant struggles
of 1942 were still afresh. The post-
war strike struggles of the workers
had just begun. The prospects had
opened up for the coming together
of the three streams of the
revolution, as convinced by Lenin-
the political general strike of the
working class, the uprising of the
mass of the peasantry and the
coming over of a section of the
armed forces to the people.
The strike in the RAF followed
by the RIAF, led to the beginnings
of planned efforts in the navy. From
December 1945 there was a stream
of incidents in HMS Talwar, a shore
establishment in Bombay. As
repression began some naval
ratings sought guidance from the
socialist and communist leaders.
Class Struggle