Vande Mataram's full version will be sung in celebrations marking song's 150 years: Shah

New Delhi, Nov 7 (PTI) Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday said the full version of "Vande Mataram" will be sung across the country as part of its 150-year celebrations, calling it a timeless call to national unity and cultural awakening.

Penning his views on his website, Shah said "Vande Mataram" is a song of freedom, the spirit of unyielding resolve and the first mantra of Bharat's awakening.

Calling it a prayer and a prophecy, he said and added that it was poet Bankim Chandra's first proclamation of Cultural Nationalism.

"To mark 150 years of this immortal hymn, the Government of India has decided to organise nationwide programs for a year starting November 7. Through these celebrations, the full version of 'Vande Mataram' will resonate across the nation once again, inspiring the youth to internalise the idea of 'Cultural Nationalism'," he wrote.

"'Vande Mataram' is the song of freedom, the spirit of unyielding resolve and the first mantra of Bharat's awakening. This sacred chant will continue to echo through eternity, reminding us to view our history, our culture, our values and our traditions through the vision of Bharatiyata (Indianness)," he said.

He said that throughout India's history, music and art have played a defining role in shaping social and political movements.

He said war songs of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj's army, the patriotic anthems of the freedom struggle, and the songs of resistance during the Emergency all awakened collective consciousness and unity in Bharatiya society.

"Among them stands 'Vande Mataram', Bharat's national song. It did not emanate from a battlefield but in the calm yet resolute mind of a scholar, Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay. In 1875, on the day of Jagaddhatri Puja (Kartik Shukla Navami or Akshaya Navami), he composed the eternal anthem of the nation's freedom. He drew inspiration from Bharat's deepest civilisational roots, from the Atharva Veda's declaration 'Mata bhumih putro aham prithivyah' ('The earth is my mother, and I am her son') to the Devi Mahatmya's invocation of the Divine Mother," he said.

"Mahatma Gandhi himself admitted that 'Vande Mataram' had 'the magical power to stir even the dullest blood.' It united liberals and revolutionaries, scholars and soldiers alike. As Maharshi Aurobindo declared, it was 'the mantra of Bharat's rebirth'," he wrote.

Citing Maharshi Aurobindo, Shah wrote that Chattopadhyay was "a sage of modern Bharat" who "reawakened" the soul of the nation through his words.

"It reminded us that Bharat is not just a geographical territory, but a geo-cultural civilisation," he wrote.

He said that Chattopadhyay's novel Anandamath was a "mantra in prose" that inspired Indians to rediscover their inner strength.

Quoting Chattopadhyay's letter, Shah noted the author once said, "'I shall have no objection if all my works are lost in the Ganga; this one hymn alone will live through eternity. It will be a great song and will win the hearts of the people.' These words were prophetic." "Only an individual brimming with devotion to the motherland could have written such lines," he said.

"Vande Mataram" transcended barriers of language and region and cited examples such as Tamil poet Subramania Bharati's Tamil translation and Punjabi revolutionaries who sang it in defiance of British rule, he wrote.

He said the sacred chant later became a rallying cry for revolutionaries of the Ghadar Party in California, soldiers of the Azad Hind Fauj and participants in the 1946 Royal Indian Navy mutiny.

"From Khudiram Bose to Ashfaqulla Khan, from Chandrashekhar Azad to Tiruppur Kumaran, the slogan echoed as one," Shah wrote.

"During the partition of Bengal in 1905, when rebellion swept across the province, the British banned public recitations of 'Vande Mataram'. Yet on 14 April 1906, in Barisal, thousands defied the order. When the police charged upon the peaceful crowd, men and women alike stood bleeding on the streets, shouting 'Vande Mataram' in unison," he said.

Shah wrote, "As we celebrate Bharat Parv and pay homage to Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel on his birth anniversary, we are reminded of how Sardar's unification of Bharat was the living embodiment of the spirit of 'Vande Mataram'." "This song is not merely a remembrance of the past but also a call to the future. Even today, Vande Mataram inspires our vision of a Viksit Bharat 2047, a confident, self-reliant and resurgent Bharat," he said. PTI ABS AMJ AMJ