A nation’s song: On Vande Mataram’s rendition

Patriotism is not just reverence for a territory or a flag but is the embodiment of solidarity with fellow citizens in a nation-state. The idea of a nation as a bond transcends family, community or faith, uniting citizens through common values and a pursuit of prosperity. National symbols and anthems exist to hone that bond. When they are changed or modified to compel citizens to accept a majoritarian version, their purpose is defeated. India’s freedom fighting generation understood this. Which is why, in 1937, the Congress Working Committee resolved that only the first two stanzas of Bankim Chatterjee’s Vande Mataram should be sung at national gatherings, since the later stanzas invoke the motherland as Hindu deities. When Jana Gana Mana was adopted as the National Anthem on January 24, 1950, India’s first President Rajendra Prasad said that Vande Mataram, even though there is no mention of a “national song” in the Constitution, would be “honoured equally”. Since then, the two-stanza version has allowed citizens of all faiths to partake in a song that stirred the freedom struggle and popularised by artistes such as Lata Mangeshkar and A.R. Rahman.

In the last year or so, the BJP-led Union government has sought to unsettle this inclusive compact. Since the song’s 150th anniversary in 2025, it has pushed for all six stanzas to be recited. The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) issued directions and circulars in 2026 and Parliament passed the Prevention of Insults to National Honour (Amendment) Act, 2026 with little debate — actions that are in line with the BJP’s habit of imposing uniformity and majoritarian preference on all citizens. The amendment extends Section 3 of the 1971 Act, which punishes anyone who intentionally prevents the singing of the National Anthem or disturbs an assembly engaged in such singing, to the National Song. Per se it does not compel anyone to sing or define the National Song or its stanzas. But read alongside the MHA orders, which prescribe an official version of all six stanzas, mandate mass singing at public functions, and place the song before the anthem, it amounts to compulsion, as a petition by T.M. Krishna in the Supreme Court has argued. The Court has rightly observed that the state may decide what the National Song is, but cannot penalise conscientious objectors in line with Bijoe Emmanuel (1986). This judgment held that no law obliges anyone to sing the Anthem, standing in respectful silence is no offence and executive instructions without statutory backing cannot curtail fundamental rights. The Court must apply Bijoe Emmanuel in full, set aside the MHA’s orders and make it clear that silence cannot be read as “disturbance”. By reverting to the vision of the freedom generation, the Court will do justice to the idea of unity in diversity.