106 HIS MAJESTY’S OPPONENT
cause had been mixed. The conversations with de Valera may have
steeled Bose’s resolve to return to India, whatever reception the British
might have in store for him.^55
Bose also had one- on- one meetings with most of the Fianna Fáil
ministers, whom he found “exceedingly sympathetic, accessible and
humane.” “Most of them had been on the run when they were fight ing
for their freedom,” he remarked, “and would be shot on sight if they
had been spotted.” He was glad to see that they had not yet become
“hardened bureaucratic ministers” and that they did not put on of fi cial
airs. He talked with the minister of lands about the abolition of land-
lordism and the redistribution of land among the peasantry. With the
minister of agriculture, he exchanged views on the balance between
food and commercial crops, including the way the cultivation of jute
was restricted in India to drive up the price during the Depression. The
role of private and state enterprise in bringing about industrial genera-
tion fig ured in his conversation with the minister of industries. Overall,
the work of the Fianna Fáil ministers seemed to him interesting and
valuable as India prepared for the task of economic reconstruction in
an in de pen dent future. He thought that W. T. Cosgrave’s opposition
party had many fine debaters, but its pro- British reputation ensured
that Fianna Fáil, along with its Labour ally, would have majority sup-
port. He met with the president of Sinn Féin, and some of its other of-
fi cials, even though he “could not wholly support” many features of
that or ga ni za tion. He would have “liked to see a more cordial relation-
ship” between Fianna Fáil and the Republicans—the sort of relations
that had prevailed when de Valera had first come to power in 1932. He
was saddened to see how those who had fought together for freedom
were drifting apart after winning state power.^56
The rivalry between different strands of the anticolonial movement,
the con flict between religiously de fined majorities and minorities, and
the agrarian question were all features that Ireland and India shared.
Despite the special relationship between Ireland and Bengal, Bose had
to correct a journalist who described him as a leader from Bengal; Bose
said firmly that he was an Indian leader and not at all provincial. In
a corridor of Dublin’s Shelbourne Hotel, he was vividly reminded of
the fact that the Irish were both supporters and opponents of empire: