1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny Quotes

“The politicians of the Congress and the Muslim League did not however, emerge from this episode, with any credit.”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence

“The hypnotism of the INA has cast its spell upon us. Netaji’s name is one to conjure with. His patriotism is second to none…”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence

“These young men, all aged between sixteen and twenty-five, were simmering due to failed promises made at the time of recruitment, horrible living conditions, unpalatable food and abhorrent racial discrimination.”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence

“On behalf of the Muslim League, Jinnah also advised the ratings to surrender. Hence, Patel, helped incongruously by Jinnah, managed to persuade the ratings to surrender on 23 February, giving an assurance that national parties would prevent any victimization – a promise he had no authority to give, nor the power to deliver upon. Nor was it kept.”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence

“Sir Stafford Cripps in 1947, speaking in the House of Commons during the debate to grant independence to India, described the alarming situation. ‘The Indian Army in India is not obeying the British officers… in these conditions if we have to rule India for a long time, we have to keep a permanent British army for a long time in a vast country of four hundred millions. We have no such army…’ His”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence

“When the British made a show of force, and threatened the ratings with low-level sorties by fighter aircraft, the ratings retaliated by training their ships’ guns on iconic Bombay landmarks, such as the Yacht Club, the Naval Dockyard, and the Gateway of India, with the warning that these would be blown up if the action escalated.”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence

“It’s worth noting that a Hindu-majority force chose a Muslim, Mohammad Shuaib (M.S.) Khan, to head the Strike Committee.”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence

“The trial led to an uproar. According to Sumit Sarkar in Modern India 1885–1947: ‘Very foolishly, the British initially decided to hold the public trial of several hundreds of the 20,000 INA prisoners, as well as dismissing from service and detaining without trial, no less than 7,000. They compounded the folly by holding the first trial in the Red Fort, Delhi, in November 1945, and putting in the dock together a Hindu, a Muslim and a Sikh.’ Unwittingly, at the street level the British united them.”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence

“I also strongly believe that Partition would have been less bloody if the political leaders had tried to build upon the communal unity created by the events of February 1946, instead of ignoring it. I”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence

“In his book, Last Years of British India, Michael Edwards, an imperialist historian, says: ‘The British had not feared Gandhi the reducer of the violence, they no longer feared Nehru, who was rapidly assuming the lineaments of statesmanship… but the ghost of Subhas Bose like Hamlet’s father, walked the battlement of Red Fort and his suddenly amplified figure overawed the conferences that were to lead to independence.”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence

“For the first time, it was revealed that the Nairs had plotted to put stones in the dal served in the dinner the night before and thus triggered the mutiny that began the next morning. Though dal with stones was not unusual but that night it was all planned to instigate the ratings to rebel.”
― Pramod Kapoor, 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence