and men were tried the seniormost japanese officer found guilty of cannibalism and hanged was lieutenant general yoshio tachibanathe japanese though were always dismissive of these charges then in 1992 a japanese historian named toshiyuki tanaka found incontrovertible evidence of japanese atrocities including cannibalism on indians and other allied prisoners his initial findings were printed by the japan times in 1997 tanaka came out with his book hidden horrors japanese war crimes in world war ii there he refuted the allies conclusion that the japanese resorted to cannibalism when their supplies dwindled tanaka said this was done under the supervision of senior officers and was perceived as a power projection toolukbased military historian amarpal sidhu recalls his grandparents who lived in singapore during wwii telling him about the fear psychosis among the indian community in singapore regarding japanese cannibalism the issue of cannibalism and other atrocities committed against indian pows by the japanese although widely known and talked about still remains one of the least researched and documented aspects of the last great war as the last veterans of the world war die out many firsthand accounts of these events are vanishing fast without being recorded sidhu told toithe japanese also tried to impose their military drill and words of command on the indian pows its recorded that captain pirzai and other officers refused the furious japanese subjected the whole unit to savage treatment but still the men didnt yield saying they were indian army officers and men and would only follow the drill of their armyanother similar incident occurred at komoriyama in new britain in 1945 there men of the 511 sikh regiment were given good conduct badges to wear the indian officers protested saying that they were men of the indian army and they would wear only badges and uniform worn in that army the men were threatened but they didnt budge then a machinegun was brought forward and the japanese threatened to shoot down all the sikhs still didnt budge this went on for five days at the end of which the japanese lost patience and flogged most of the men till they passed outonly 5500 indians came out of japanese captivity alive and despite all the hardships the men refused to break their indian army oath and join the japanesesponsored indian independence league or ina what emerges from all these recorded incidents is a picture of amazing fortitude shown by indian pows a kind of professionalism and apolitical behaviour that perhaps still characterises the indian army of todaysoldiers who didnt die in the firing being bayoneted to deathdifferent historians have come up with different explanations for this some say it was because the men at least the officers were highly anglicised sandhursttrained men who also came from families that had a history of generations of loyal service to the british but in the words of claude auchinleck these men didnt have any particular loyalty towards britainthe men were loyal to each other to their regiments to