The Indian National Army usually evokes passionate responses in India. Its Commander-in-Chief Subhas Chandra Bose is the subject of several hagiographies and the army is often eulogised as the second front of the Indian Freedom Struggle. It has also been vilified by historians and writers who argue that the INA was an insignificant chapter in India's military history. This article lays down some historiographical observations on the INA as a prelude to a balanced and critical analysis of the outfit.
Dalit responses to the critique of Ambedkar's role in the freedom struggle and his construction of the national movement have led to a re-examination of his ideas, and perceptions of the nationalist discourse of the time. Why he and the dalits did not participate directly in the national movement, as directed by the Congress, is a question that needs to be addressed.
Born in Hyderabad, India in 1879 Sarojini Naidu received a British education. Her poems pick up the diction of the English decadents, transposing the images into India. The pained passive women in her poetry stand however in radical contrast to Naidu's own life: she was a close friend of Gandhi's and active in the National movement, suffering imprisonment numerous times. In 1925 she was elected the first Indian women president of the National Congress. How can the cleft between her poetry and her politics be explained? What does it reveal about the complex procedures of Naidu's own evolving feminism as it struggled with colonialism?
