Rare photos, documents of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose gathering dust in a 'museum' in Odisha
KENDRAPADA: Many rare and valuable documents, photographs, stamps, letters, objects and other documents on the life and work of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and his Azad Hind Fauj are gathering dust in the narrow and serpentine lane of Badahat locality in Kendrapada town since long.
These items, all collected by Mohammed Mustaqe, an advocate, during his four-decade long efforts, are being displayed in a room turned into a museum but are in desperate need of better care.
These items, all collected by Mohammed Mustaqe, an advocate, during his four-decade long efforts, are being displayed in a room turned into a museum but are in desperate need of better care.
Mustaque (58) converted one of the rooms into a Netaji museum to preserve all the objects. He collected these items during his four-decade-long efforts.
"But these artefacts are crammed into a 10x10 sq feet room, they need to be conserved," said Mustaque.
This Netaji museum preserves the gazette notification of Bihar and Orissa of 1913 where it was mentioned that Netaji passed his entrance examination in 1913, a handwritten letter of Captain Dr Laxmi Sahgal of the Indian National Army, the original copies of the magazine "Forward" published by Netaji from 1925 to 1927, the special issue of INA "Basumati", a Bengali magazine and the only postal stamp issued by the INA under the leadership of Netaji in 1942 after liberating Manipur. Around 150 rare photographs, hundreds of old newspaper clippings and many postal stamps on Netaji are also displayed in his museum.
"But these artefacts are crammed into a 10x10 sq feet room, they need to be conserved," said Mustaque.
This Netaji museum preserves the gazette notification of Bihar and Orissa of 1913 where it was mentioned that Netaji passed his entrance examination in 1913, a handwritten letter of Captain Dr Laxmi Sahgal of the Indian National Army, the original copies of the magazine "Forward" published by Netaji from 1925 to 1927, the special issue of INA "Basumati", a Bengali magazine and the only postal stamp issued by the INA under the leadership of Netaji in 1942 after liberating Manipur. Around 150 rare photographs, hundreds of old newspaper clippings and many postal stamps on Netaji are also displayed in his museum.
Subash brought homeopathy medicines in boxes from Cuttack to Korei to treat the patients. The family members of Hazari donated one homeopathy medicine box , a lantern and a Muguni glass to me 12 years back which were used by Subash and I preserved the items in the Netaji museum at Kendrapada, added Mustaque.
"I have approached the district administration umpteen times to provide me a piece of land and fund so that I can build a proper Netaji museum at Kendrapada. I also offered to donate all my collections to the museum but the officials have not even chosen any site for the proposed museum," said a dejected Mustaque.
When contacted, Niranjan Behera, the sub-collector of Kendrapada, said, "The authorities after properly examining the application of Mohammad Mustaque will grant a piece of land for the museum"
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