Women at War

Among the more improbable events of the Asia-Pacific Theater in World War II was the creation in Singapore in 1943 of a corps of female Indian combat soldiers, the Rani of Jhansi Regiment. Until now the history of these brave women soldiers is little known, their extraordinary service largely unexplored.

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Among the more improbable events of the Asia-Pacific Theater in World War II was the creation in Singapore in 1943 of a corps of female Indian combat soldiers, the Rani of Jhansi Regiment. They served under Indian freedom fighter Subhas Chandra Bose in the Indian National Army.

This exile army consisting of fifty thousand Indian men and women was formed in cooperation with the Japanese Army, joining the Axis powers to liberate India from British colonial rule. The women of the INA were deployed in the Burma Campaign during the final stages of WWII. Because the creation of an Indian all-female regiment of combat soldiers was a radical military innovation in 1943, and because the role of women in today's broader context of Indian culture has become a prevalent and pressing issue, the extensive testimony of the surviving veterans of thisunit is timely and urgent. Until now the history of these brave women soldiers is little known, their extraordinary service and the role played by Bose remains largelyunexplored.

Five broad developments converged in the summer of 1943 to facilitate the creation of the Rani of Jhansi Regiment. First, in recent decades Mohandas Gandhi's efforts to mobilize Indian women for the independence movement had inspired some women to join political life. Second, antithetical to Gandhi's passive resistance, the use of weapons, including by women, became an instrument in the fight for Indian independence. Third, Bose, the most prominent leader promoting armed rebellion against the British Raj, held advanced views for his time on gender issues. Fourth, the total defeat of the British by the Japanese in Burma, Malaya and Singapore in early 1942 had shaken the myth of Imperial invincibility and fanned the embers of Indian nationalism in the Southeast Asian diaspora. And fifth, tens of thousands of Indianprisoners of war held by the Japanese Army in Malaya combined with this intensified Indian nationalism, led Bose to conclude that the best chance for liberation of Indiawas a military invasion across the Indo-Burma border.

The confluence of these disparate factors inspired Bose to recruit women from the Indian diaspora. And the women dared to exploit the opportunity to enlist in the Rani of Jhansi Regiment. The central themes of this book comprise the details of this alignment of social and political forces and their materialization in the establishment, recruitment, training and deployment to Burma of these fighting women.

In the years since the RJR surrender in 1945, the story of Subhas Chandra Bose and the Rani Regiment of female combatants as signature symbols of both the national fight for independence and of Indian women's struggle for gender equality has taken on the aspect of myth. Lengthy interviews with the veteran Ranis together with archival research comprise the evidence that separates the myth of the Bengali hero and his jungle warrior maidens from historical fact, and this resulting book presents an accurate narrative of the Ranis. The facts are nearly as impressive as the myth.