Netaji is dead, but not in plane crash: Commission

New Delhi, May 17 (UNI) The disappearance of Indian National Army (INA) founder and freedom fighter Subash Chandra Bose 60 years ago continues to remain a mystery with the Mukherjee Commission of Inquiry, whose report was made public today, also failing to solve the riddle surrounding his death.

The Inquiry Commission concluded after a six-year-long investigation into one of great mysteries of freedom struggle that "Netaji," as he is popularly known, is dead, but it was not in the plane crash in Taiwan in 1945 as was widely believed. It also disputed the belief that the ashes kept in a casket in a Japanese temple were that of Netaji.

However, the report did not say how Netaji had died.

The Government rejected the findings of the Commission that the charismatic leader, who led the rebel INA and fought British colonial rule in India from Japan and Burma during World War II, did not die in a plane crash and that the ashes kept in a temple in Japan were not that of the INA hero.

The three-volume report of the inquiry commission headed by M K Mukherjee, former Supreme Court judge, along with Action Taken Report (ATR) of the government was today placed on the table of both houses of Parliament by Home Minister Shivraj Patil.

''The government has examined the report submitted by the Commission on November 8, 2005 in detail and have not agreed with the findings that : Netaji did not die in the plane crash and (b) the ashes in the Renkoji Temple were not of Netaji,'' the ATR said.

There has been a general belief that Netaji had died in a Japanese air crash in Taiwan in August, 1945 at the age of 48 and his asjhs were sent to Japan.

The Commission, appointed by the BJP-led government in 1999, pointed out that there were five versions about the manner of his death: that he was murdered at the Red Fort on August 15, 1945, died in an air crash at Taihoku (now Taipei) in Taiwan (formerly Formosa) on August 18, 1945, at Dehradun in 1977, at Sheopurkalan in Madhya Pradesh on May 21, 1977 or at Ram Bhawan in Faizabad on September 16, 1985.

''...it is found that none of the versions relating to his death has been established,'' the report said.

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