The New Indian’s editor-in-chief Aarti Tikoo recorded a tell-all interview with Shakti Singh, chief of Subhash Chandra Bose Rashtriya Vichar Manch in February 2022.
It was in his house in Faizabad where Gumnami Baba breathed his last. Singh took a personal interest in unraveling the mystery behind the identity of his tenant of two and a half years.
It was after his death when Nejai’s neice started going through his items that Singh and others could substantiate the Bose link that they had speculated for a long. Singh is convinced that it was Bose who lived in his house.
“In 1982, a relative of Gumnami Baba came to me and asked for accommodation for him, since Ayodhya was too far for the family to take care of him. Later, we came to know that he had a team of people shifting him from one place to another the moment the stories about him being Bose raised suspicions about his identity,” he said.
Gumnami Baba died on September 16, 1985, and was cremated at Guptar Ghat (Ayodhya) on September 18, 1985. Netaji’s niece Lalita Bose visited Singh’s residence to verify the rumours. While rummaging through Gumnami Baba’s belongings, Lalita found some documents that gave credence to these unverified reports, says Singh.