Netaji's philosophy of life is one of the earliest expositions on Bose's social, political and economic thoughts, written in 1948 by Anil Roy, a revolutionary and a close associate. An accomplished scholar, musician, social worker and politician, Roy became the chief organiser of the Forward Bloc movement in the 1940s. Anil Roy and Leela Nag (Roy) got married in 1939. This book was written at a time when Forward Bloc as a political party was going through a crisis - it split into a Subhasist and a Marxist faction. Roy led the Subhasist movement. We provide below the English translation of selected chapters.

The foundation of the modern capitalist society is aggressive individualism. Unrestricted competition, domination of many by the enriched few, in the name of freedom, is the consequence of the creed of individualism. Today, freedom belongs only to a select few – the majority of people cannot be said to have any freedom. Socialism vows to spread this freedom to all classes in the society. Only socialism carries the spirit of freedom today. Freedom is hollow without socialism. The balance in economic life has crumble in the modern society. While the upper crust lives an affluent life, large sections of the society struggle in the darkness of poverty. It is the task of socialism to remove this imbalance and reconstruct society. Socialism is, therefore, a part of the multifaceted synthesis required in the modern age. But, it provides only a partial synthesis.

Socialism is one of the key themes in Netaji’s doctrine. Thus, he insists on economic and social emancipation along with political freedom. “In my opinion, however, the fight for political freedom will have to be conducted simultaneously with the fight for socio-economic emancipation,” he told Romain Rolland in 1935. As he told the Amraoti Students’ Conference in 1929, “If freedom is to be the cardinal principle of our life – the élan vital of all our activity – it should also be made the basis of social reconstruction. It will be seen at once that if the principle of freedom is to be applied to society and made the fundamental basis of the future – it will mean nothing short of social revolution…Thus freedom implies equality and equality connotes fraternity…the inequalities of wealth that stand in the way of the social advancement will have to be removed and equal opportunities for education and development will have to be given…these should be some of the basic principles of the new society that we want to build.

This line of thought led Netaji to announce in 1931 that he favoured a socialist republic in India. Netaji is a socialist because only socialism can answer the problem of widespread poverty in the country: only socialism can remove the physical hunger. Therefore socialism provides the new synthesis on the material plane. But this synthesis alone is not all in modern human life. Today’s social life is riven by innumerable imbalances. Among these, the imbalance of wealth is only one. The material life thus needs a balance with spiritual development. Even the mental and spiritual life has many aspects to it: intellect, emotion, and desire. Similarly, the material life too is determined by geography, tradition, society, politics, biological and sexual aspects. An equilibrium needs to be maintained once these different aspects are connected by a common thread. A wholesome balance of all these factors is the main message of Netaji’s doctrine. The earth will transform to the Garden of Eden just by the advent of socialism, is therefore, a myth.

While Marxism has overemphasised the economic aspect of life, Gandhism has laid excessive stress on the spiritual life. Whereas Gandhism is a reaction to the rampant materialism of modern world, Marxism too is a reaction to the widespread imbalance of wealth and incidence of poverty. Marxism is a form of socialism, but not limited to the economic sphere of life. Combining economic socialism with materialism and materialistic interpretations of life, it has transformed into a completely unique philosophy. Although a socialist, Netaji, however, was against importing Marxism into India. Advocating a new synthesis for India, time and again, he spoke about establishing socialism on a new foundation in India.

Indian Socialism

According to Netaji, an ideology cannot be practicable by being time-and-space-agnostic: it needs to grow up in tandem with the realities of the environment. “In applying any theory to practice, you can never rule out geography or history. If you attempt it, you are bound to fail. I also think India should attempt to evolve her own form of socialism.” – Netaji told the All India Trade Union Congress in 1931. He also held that there was no need to import the Russian Marxism into India. The idea that inspired his political philosophy was that an Indian socialism, constructed on the basis of local environment and tradition, will set a unique example in the world. “It may be that the form of socialism which India will evolve will have something new and original about it, which will be of benefit to the whole world.”

Netaji is a strong advocate of the fact that India needs to learn and assimilate lessons from other countries. This belief was one of the contributors to his differences with Gandhism. Gandhiji wanted to do away with almost everything of modern civilisation. But Netaji was an enthusiastic advocate of modernism. He emphasised time and again that India would assimilate the lessons of modern civilisation. But that, he stressed, would have to be different from blind imitation. As he told the Naujawan Bharat Sabha on May 31, 1931, “While seeking light and inspiration from abroad, we cannot forget that we should not blindly imitate any other people and we should assimilate what we learn elsewhere after finding out what will suit our national requirements…I should therefore like to strike a note of warning to those who may feel tempted to follow blindly the tenets of Bolshevism.”

Many workers in India are blind admirers of Marxism. Especially those who work on the peasant and labourer fronts consider Marxism as flawless and inevitable. They are not aware that it is a distorted version of socialism due to its excesses. They cannot imagine that it is possible to establish a political rule of the peasants and labourers on socialist lines, even without taking recourse to Marxism. Actually the differences between socialism and Marxist communism are not yet clear in this country. Social reconstruction in India will have to take place on the basis of India’s own requirements and a unique Indian plan of action. Thus, Netaji warned the Trade Union Congress of 1931 that “…we should not surrender to the dictate of Amsterdam or Moscow. India will have to work out her own methods and adapt herself to her environment and to her own special needs.” No nation can create anything new by ignoring its past. In case of such attempts, history will extract revenge. The nation will have to go through terrible reaction and disasters in order to correct the distortions. Referring to the forms of socialism apparent in the certain Indian societies, he pointed out, “Nowadays new thought of socialism is travelling to India from the West and it is revolutionising the thoughts of many, but the ideas of socialism are not a novelty in this country. We regard them as such only because we have lost the thread of our own history…It would therefore be folly to rely for enlightenment on Russia. We shall build our own society and politics according to our own ideals and according to our needs. (Rangpur, 1929)”

The central point of conflict between Marxism and Netaji’s political philosophy therefore revolves around giving rise to an Indian form of socialism. Indigenising socialism however requires a method of balancing and synthesising its different aspects. The assimilative and synthesising capacity that is at the root of Indian history, will have to be given a new shape in the new environment. This synthesis is the key theme of Netaji’s political philosophy. He described the various streams of thought and suggested the way ahead, in his speech to the Trade Union Congress in 1931. He pointed out that “Various currents and cross currents of thought sometimes make the trade union workers feel bewildered as to the path, or modus operandi they should follow.  There is on the one hand, the Right Wing who stands for a reformist programme above everything else. On the other side, there are our communist friends who, if I have understood them alright, are adherents and followers of Moscow…Between these two groups is another group which stands for socialism – for full-blooded socialism – but which desires that India should evolve her own form of socialism as well as her own methods…I have no doubt in my mind that the salvation of India, as of the world, depends on socialism. India should learn from and profit by the experience of other nations – but India should be able to evolve her own methods in keeping with her own needs and her own environment.” Netaji’s brand of socialism is thus a new form based on India’s tradition.