Two days before the Narendra Modi government begins declassifying secret files on Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Thursday flayed successive Congress regimes for not taking steps to unravel the mystery behind the revolutionary leader's disappearance.
"We all know about Netaji's birthday. But even today, the veil has not lifted on what happened to him, under what circumstances he disappeared.
"Wasn't it the responsibility of successive Congress regimes of independent India to unravel the mystery behind the disappearance of the leader who played such a prominent part in making the country free, the leader on whose call youth used to get all charged up to fight the British rulers?"
"Steps should have been taken to uncover the mystery behind his disappearance. The Congress governments did not take them," Rajnath Singh said at a rally here in North 24 Parganas district.
He said Prime Minister Modi has taken a big decision by declaring that all secret files on Netaji will be declassified.
"We assure you, we will bring in public all the documents concerning Netaji's disappearance," he said.
The Modi government is scheduled to declassify the secret Netaji files in a phased manner beginning January 23, his birth anniversary.