I.N.A. Defence. by INDIAN NATIONAL ARMY - DESAI, Bhulabhai J - 1946 & [1945?]: Subject People's Right to Fight for Freedom.

Bombay & Delhi Congress Publication Board & I.N.A. Defence Comittee, 1946 & [1945?]. Impassioned and important defence of the right to take up arms in the cause of independence Two contemporary publications of the address delivered by Desai in defence of the members of the Indian National Army on trial for treason, both produced around the same time (December 1945-January 1946). Scarce, the Congress Publication Board edition shows only one location on Library Hub (BL), the INA defence committee edition shows three.
In October 1945, three officers from the pro-independence INA, which had formed a rebel government during the war and claimed the right to use military means to claim India's sovereignty, were court-martialled. The leading counsel for their defence was the veteran independence activist, Bhulabhai Desai. His speech at the trial became an instant classic. Drawing examples from the American declaration of Independence and Garibaldi's revolution, as well as quoting extensively from Churchill arguing in favour of rebel movements, he asserts the rights of the INA to use force to win Indian independence.
These are two distinct editions of this speech. One in boards, published in January 1946 by the Indian National Congress, includes an introduction by Indian lawyer, M.C. Setalvad, who later became India's first Attorney General. The copy in wraps, published by the INA Defence Committee, contains an introduction dated December 27th, 1945 and, therefore, was probably released either at the very end of 1945 or early in 1946. The introduction was written by Kailash Nath Katju, another member of the defence counsel.
Octavo. Original publisher's boards, title in black to spine and front cover. With the pictorial dust jacket, the design adapting the famous image "Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima". Original publisher's wrappers. Both housed in tricolour cloth drop-back box, the colours of the INA flag with spinning wheel device in blue, I.N.A. gilt to the spine. Copy in boards: half-tone portrait frontispiece of Desai and one similar plate. Copy in wraps: one half tone plate with portrait of Desai. Copy in Boards: Inscribed on front pastedown "To [illegible] from Aloo. January 1946". Boards a little rubbed, text block a little browned. A very good copy in the dust jacket, which is a little chipped and foxed but with only very minor loss around the top of the spine. Copy in wrappers: wrappers lightly rubbed. A very good copy.