The release of about 2,890 files pertaining to the Kennedy assassination this week was expected to throw new light on one of the enduring mysteries of the last century. Who really killed President John Kennedy and why? Was it really Lee Harvey Oswald or was there a second gunman? Was it a Soviet conspiracy or was it Castro’s revenge? Was it Edgar Hoover, notorious head of FBI getting back at the Kennedys, or was it a CIA job gone rogue? Was it someone from the mob? Well, even after the release of all those files, we are no wiser. The mystery endures.

Closer home we have the mystery surrounding Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose’s disappearance in 1945. The Modi government’s step to declassify a couple of ‘secret’ government files was expected to reveal the truth and finally bring some form of closure. Sadly, the truth remains elusive. Did Netaji really die in a plane crash? Was he taken prisoner by the Soviets and exiled to Siberia? Was it really his ashes that were kept in a Japanese Buddhist monastery? Or did he come back as a wandering monk and settle in India once again? There are no answers to any of these speculative questions. Our television channels of course made much noise over the family of Bose being kept under surveillance for some years after independence.

Sometimes one has to wonder what is really so top secret that these files had to be kept in cold storage for 50 years. Thousands of manhours and plenty of money has been wasted on chasing half-baked theories. Historians and bored columnists can write ad naruseum but it is time for the Government to put an end to this charade and move on. Perhaps the ‘law of limitation’ ought to apply to enquiry commissions and probes into the ‘disappearance’ or assassination of political leaders beyond a certain period of time, say 10 years. You can’t rewrite history, undo its effects or bring back fallen icons.

Associate Editor

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