A. C. N. Nambiar

Arathil Chandeth Narayanan Nambiar (1896–1986) was an Indian Nationalist and a friend and colleague of Subhas Chandra Bose. Originally from Kerala (he was born in Thalassery), Nambiar spent much of his life serving the Indian independence movement in Europe.

Nambiar had been working in Europe as a left-wing journalist for some time when the Second World War broke out. In the 1930s he had been beaten up by Nazi stormtroopers, imprisoned, and then deported, at first to Prague. At the outbreak of war he was working in Paris.

According to MI5 documents that remained classified until 2014, the British believed Nambiar was a Soviet spy before the war. The documents show that a Soviet defector in the 1950s said Nambiar had been an agent of the GRU in the 1920s. Nambiar had visited Moscow in 1929 while active in Indian communist organisations. (The declassified documents also included correspondence between Nambiar and Bose captured after the surrender of German submarine U-234.)

In January 1942 he joined the Free India Centre as second in command to Bose. This organisation was set up by Bose to promote Indian independence and to assist the enemies of the British empire, namely Nazi Germany, the Empire of Japan, and the other Axis powers. Nambiar was a reluctant recruit; his anti-Nazi politics put him in an uncomfortable position, but he finally succumbed to Bose's persuasiveness and moved to Berlin. Nambiar established a branch of the Free India Centre in Paris before leaving. The Berlin Centre was given the status of a foreign mission by Germany and ran a propaganda radio station. It also controlled and recruited the Indian Legion. This had been founded by Bose and was mainly recruited from Indian prisoners of war and officered by Germans. It was originally intended to use it to fight the British in India, but it was eventually deployed to defend the French coast. It was never a significant military force, never consisting of more than a few thousand men.

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