Rohit Kumar
NEW DELHI, Nov 9: With the elections to the West Bengal state Assembly round the corner, the ruling Trinamool Congress and the opposition BJP have opened a new front of conflict with two great Bengal authors and icons at the center stage and each party accusing the other of “insulting” one of the great sons in preference to the other.
While the BJP is celebrating nation-wide 150th anniversary of the composition of the “Vande Mataram” written by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyaya and accused the TMC of insulting the national song, the TMC in turn played up the national anthem composed by Rabindranath Tagore and accused the BJP of insulting the Nobel Laureate.
The Congress also stepped up its attack on the Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the “Vande Mataram” row on Sunday claiming that the PM had “insulted” the Congress Working Committee of 1937, which issued a statement on the song, as also Rabindranath Tagore, and said he should fight his political battles on current issues of daily concern.
The Congress general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh said the Prime Minister insulting the CWC and Tagore was shocking but not surprising “since the RSS had played no role in our Freedom Movement led by Mahatma Gandhi.”
On the West Bengal pitch, the battle was fought furiously between the two parties. The TMC pointed out at the Karnataka BJP leader Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri remark that “Vande Mataram” should have been the national anthem and not “Jana Gana Mana” which he claimed, was written by Tagore as a welcome song for British officials.
Though he later retracted his statement after widespread criticism, the TMC hit out at the BJP saying it was an insult to the Nobel Laureate. The BJP, on the other hand, accused the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC of downplaying the Vande Mataram celebrations. On the same day when the BJP announced a year-long celebration of Vande Mataram, the West Bengal government declared that all state-run and government-aided schools would sing the state song Banglar Mati, Banglar Jol, written by Tagore.
On Friday as the country, and particularly the BJP, celebrated 150 years of Vande Mataram, the TMC paid floral tribute to Tagore. State Education Minister Bratya Basu told the media, “The BJP practices divisive politics — between Hindus and Muslims, Brahmins and Dalits — and now they are trying to create a rift between two great Bengalis, Rabindranath Tagore and Bankim Chandra. The BJP prefers Bankim Chandra because Tagore spoke of Hindu-Muslim unity, and leaders like Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Subhas Chandra Bose respected him deeply.”
While the BJP alleged that the TMC’s stance was “appeasement politics,” the TMC refuted the claim, stating that the state government had already formed a committee to honor Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyaya.
On Saturday, BJP MP and Union Minister Sukanta Majumdar slammed the TMC. “Whenever Mamata Banerjee faces a political crisis, she remembers Bengali ‘asmita (pride)’. This is only for show. Vande Mataram is a political song, and we are protesting.”
On the same day the TMC organized a rally at Jorasanko Thakur Bari, Tagore’s ancestral home in North Kolkata to pay tribute to him, followed by a protest rally. State Minister Sashi Panja said, “We are all hurt by the BJP’s insult to Bengal’s icons. Here, at Tagore’s abode, we draw our inspiration and courage — our culture and life revolve around him. Our protest is against this insult. Bengal is a mini-India where people of all castes, creed, and religions live peacefully. Why divide us? Tagore’s works are translated across languages; he lives in our hearts.”
The Congress attack on the BJP and Mr Modi came after the Prime Minister had said the important stanzas of “Vande Mataram” were dropped in 1937, which sowed the seeds of the partition, and asserted that such a “divisive mindset” was still a challenge for the country.
Mr Modi had made the comments after inaugurating the year-long commemoration of “Vande Mataram” to mark 150 years of the national song. Modi also released a commemorative stamp and coin on the occasion.
In a post on
The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi Volume 66, page 46, reveals that on October 28, 1937, the CWC issued a statement on Vande Mataram, and this statement had been profoundly influenced by Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore and his advice, he said on X.
“The Prime Minister has insulted this CWC as also Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore. That he should have done so is shocking but not surprising since the RSS had played no role in our Freedom Movement led by Mahatma Gandhi,” Mr Ramesh said. The prime minister should fight his political battles on current issues that are of daily concern to crores of Indians who worry about their present and future, he said.
“His economic policies have sharpened inequalities. Unemployment has scaled new highs. Investment momentum has been lost. His foreign policy has collapsed. He stands thoroughly exposed. And all he does is abuse and defame India’s first Prime Minister (Jawaharlal Nehru),” Ramesh said. The Congress general secretary shared screenshots of the statement of the CWC on X.
“Gradually the use of the first two stanzas of the (Vande Mataram) song spread to other provinces and a certain national significance began to attach to them. The rest of the song was very rarely used and is even now known by few persons. These two stanzas described in tender language the beauty of the motherland and the abundance of her gifts,” the CWC statement of 1937 said.
There was absolutely nothing in them to which objection could be taken from the religious or any other point of view, it said. “’There is nothing in these stanzas to which any one can take exception. The other stanzas of the song are little known and hardly ever sung. They contain certain allusions and a religious ideology which may not be in keeping with the ideology of other religious groups in India,” the statement said.
“Taking all things into consideration therefore the Committee recommends that wherever the Bande Mataram is sung at national gatherings only the first two stanzas should be sung, with perfect freedom to the organizers to sing any other song of an unobjectionable character, in addition to, or in the place of, the Bande Mataram song,” the statement had said.
But while there can be no question about the place that Vande Mataram has come to occupy in national life, the same cannot be said as to the other songs, the CWC had said in 1937. “People have adopted songs of their choice, irrespective of merit. An authentic collection has long been felt as a desideratum. The Committee therefore appoint a sub-committee consisting of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Jawaharlal Nehru, Subhas Chandra Bose and Narendra Dev, to examine all current national songs. that may be sent to it and those who are so inclined are invited to send their compositions to this sub-committee,” it said.
The sub-committee would out of the songs so received, submit to the Working Committee the collection that it may choose to recognize as being worthy of finding a place in a collection of national songs, the CWC had said.
“Only such songs as are composed in simple Hindustani or can be adapted to it, and have a rousing and inspiring tune will be accepted by the sub-committee for examination. The sub-committee shall consult and take the advice of poet Rabindranath Tagore,” it had said.
On Saturday, Ramesh shared screenshots of pages 110-112 from volume 4 of the authoritative biography in Bengali of Tagore titled Rabindra-Jeebanee by Prabhat Kumar Mukhopadhyay, published by Visva-Bharati in 1994. “The Master Distorian of a PM must render an apology. He has insulted our founding fathers and most of all Tagore himself,” Ramesh had said.
The Congress had hit back at Prime Minister Modi on Friday after he had attacked the party over the dropping of stanzas from “Vande Mataram” in 1937, saying Tagore himself had suggested that the first two stanzas of the song be adopted and it was “shameful” of the PM to accuse the Nobel Laureate of harboring a divisive ideology.
The Opposition party had also demanded an apology from Mr Modi over his statement. According to various accounts, a truncated version of “Vande Mataram”, keeping only the first two of the six original stanzas, was chosen as the national song in 1937 by the Congress after a panel recommended its adoption.
According to excerpts from the book, screenshots of which were shared by Mr Ramesh on
In a letter to Nehru, Tagore wrote, “To me, the spirit of tenderness and devotion expressed in its first portion, the emphasis it gave to beautiful and beneficent aspects of our motherland made a special appeal, so much so that I found no difficulty in dissociating it from the rest of the poem and from those portions of the book of which it is a part, with all the sentiments of which, brought up as I was in the monotheistic ideals of my father, I could have no sympathy.”
