186 HIS MAJESTY’S OPPONENT
On December 16, 1940, one of the government’s agents reported
that Mian Akbar Shah was coming from the frontier to meet with Sub-
has Chandra Bose. Akbar Shah hailed from Nowshera in the NWFP
and was the provincial head of the Forward Bloc, formed by Bose in
1939 to pressure the Indian National Congress toward a more radical
confrontation with the British raj. Bose had cabled Akbar Shah, invit-
ing him to visit Calcutta, and the police agent had seized upon the
government’s first useful and potentially dangerous piece of informa-
tion. As a young man, in 1920, Akbar had crossed the tribal territories
and Afghanistan to reach the Soviet Union. Bose now asked him to
help plan the escape route from Peshawar to Kabul. As a cover, they
spread the word that Bose wanted Akbar Shah to or ga nize a major For-
ward Bloc conference, and this falsehood was what the intelligence op-
erative reported to the authorities.^12
Sisir was introduced to Mian Akbar Shah, and the two went together
to Wachel Molla’s department store in central Calcutta, where Akbar
Shah purchased some baggy shalwars (trousers) and a black fez for
Bose’s disguise. Sisir then dropped him off at the Howrah railway sta-
tion, where he caught a train back to the frontier. In the following days,
Sisir bought a suitcase, an attaché case, and a bedroll, as well as two
flannel shirts, toiletries, pillows, and quilts. Dressed in European attire,
with a felt hat on his head, he went to a printing shop and ordered a set
of calling cards, which read: “Mohd. Ziauddin, B.A., LL.B., Traveling
Inspector, The Empire of India Life Assurance Co. Ltd., Permanent Ad-
dress: Civil Lines, Jubbulpore.”^13
On Christmas Day 1940, Sisir went through an endurance test: he
drove from Calcutta to Burdwan, a railway junction, in the morning;
had lunch at the station; and returned the same day. In early January he
visited his eldest brother, Asoke, near Dhanbad, on the pretext of fetch-
ing his mother and other members of the family, and took the oppor-
tunity to scout out the area. On the return journey, his parents’ Stude-
baker President (in which he was traveling as a passenger) broke down,
and he, along with other family members, had to return to Calcutta in
a ramshackle taxi. About the same time, Sarat came back to Calcutta
from a three- week vacation in the hill station of Kalimpong, and was
immediately informed of the plan by Subhas. The elder brother sug-