Indian Muslim soldiers: heroic role in Indonesia's liberation
Indonesia (then known as "Netherlands East Indies") during the World War II was fighting its war of independence from the Dutch clutches. Allied forces (British and Dutch) under the pretext of fighting the Japanese were deployed at various places. The "Gurkha" regiment was part of these forces comprised of Muslims, Sikhs, Jats and Marhatas. During their operations, they found that they were not deployed to fight the Japanese but to suppress the Indonesians who were struggling to throw away the Dutch yoke of slavery. Repeated cries of "Allah-u-Akbar" from the resisting Indonesians and their villages made the Muslim soldiers realise that they were misled by the British and, in fact, were made to fight their co-religionists. Inspired by the zeal of jihad, 600 Muslim soldiers defected from the British forces and joined the Indonesian resistance group of freedom fighters alongwith their arms and ammunitions.
