Uncut Anthem

A country unsure of itself trims its symbols whereas a confident one restores them. By mandating the full six-stanza rendition of ‘Vande Mataram’ at official functions, the Modi government has chosen confidence and in doing so has exposed the Opposition’s chronic unease with India’s civilisational inheritance.

The original composition by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee which runs to three minutes and ten seconds will now be sung before the national anthem ‘Jana Gana Mana’ with attendees standing to attention. The Centre’s decision replaces an abbreviated version of ‘Vande Mataram’ that had, for decades, passed for prudence. A republic that reclaimed sovereignty in 1947 need not forever behave like a nervous caretaker of inherited anxieties.

The most vociferous objections have predictably emanated from the Trinamool Congress and the Congress, who have countered the move by stating that the BJP’s stance on Vande Mataram was clearly politically motivated, aimed at consolidating support ahead of the key Assembly election in West Bengal.

TMC leaders have accused the BJP of ‘rewriting history.’ But history is being restored in this instance. The six stanzas are not an afterthought foisted on the nation by a latter-day government. They were part of the song’s canonical life, sung and revered long before the Constituent Assembly opted for truncation in 1950. That decision, taken amid the raw politics of Partition, reflected a moment of fragility. It should not be fossilised as a permanent standard.

The Opposition’s argument collapses under its own weight. If the abridgement of ‘Vande Mataram’ was a pragmatic move to assuage minority sentiments, why treat its reversal as sacrilege? If the Bankim Chandra’s original song was genuinely offensive, then why did it animate generations of freedom fighters across Bengal and beyond, revolutionaries and moderates alike, who found in ‘Vande Mataram’ a shared obeisance to the motherland? The unflattering truth is that cultural compromise after Independence became a habit that masqueraded as principle. By mandating the complete song at constitutional occasions, the current government has signalled that national identity is not a negotiable add-on.

The political row also reveals a deeper problem with the Opposition which is an inability to distinguish pluralism from self-erasure. India’s nationalism has never been monochrome. It has absorbed languages, regions and traditions without dissolving its civilisational core. To sing all six stanzas of ‘Vande Mataram’ is not to exclude but acknowledge the sources from which the freedom movement drew its moral force. The goddess imagery that so agitates critics was never a demand for worship. It was a metaphor for belonging. The charge that the move is election-timed is thin. Cultural decisions, if they are to be taken at all, will always occur in political time.

Nations grow up when they stop apologising for their inheritance and start stewarding it. For too long, ‘Vande Mataram’ was reduced to an annual hashtag or a ceremonial chorus. Restoring it in full is a reminder that unity does not require amnesia. It requires honesty.