From coastal Andhra Pradesh to Jallianwala Bagh in Punjab, from bonfires in UP to midnight pledges in Chennai and Lahore, Vande Mataram was a war cry to galvanise people toward azaadi.
Idolatry is anti-science, was the private belief of Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, who wrote the song whose idolatry became one of the most divisive issues during India’s national movement.
Coal-based power generation fell 3% in 2025 while renewable capacity surged to 40% of India’s installed power mix, according to India Power Sector Review 2025 by CREA.
Pakistan military said it has assured Bangladesh of fast-tracked delivery of Super Mushshak trainer aircraft during high level defence meet held Tuesday.
Many of you might think I got something so wrong in National Interest pieces written this year. I might disagree! But some deserve a Mea Culpa. I’d deal with the most recent this week.
A discussion becomes a debate when highly contentious points are made that cannot go unchallenged by the other side. In the case of this “discussion” , the PM did highlight the big role played by the song in inspiring the freedom fighters. But he took a negative track by trying to vilify the Congress for truncating the song. The references to Hindu deities in the latter part of the song would have made minorities like Jains, Muslims, CHristians, Buddhists uncomfortaable , since they have no such gods. Tagore and Nehru made this more acceptable as a national song by suggesting that only the first half be retained. The full song could aalways be sung in other contexts. Instead of understanding this, the PM stated that the Congress bent the knee to Muslims. In trying to score brownie points against the Congress , the PM unfortunately lost the fundamental purpose of the “discussion “. The importance of Vande Mataram was lost to the general public , who rely a lot on the PM’s words due to his popularity. For obvious reasons, Ms Lekhi has avoided mentioning this scooring of brownie points by the PM and has tried to dump the entire blame on the Congress for turning the discussion into a debate.
A discussion becomes a debate when highly contentious points are made that cannot go unchallenged by the other side. In the case of this “discussion” , the PM did highlight the big role played by the song in inspiring the freedom fighters. But he took a negative track by trying to vilify the Congress for truncating the song. The references to Hindu deities in the latter part of the song would have made minorities like Jains, Muslims, CHristians, Buddhists uncomfortaable , since they have no such gods. Tagore and Nehru made this more acceptable as a national song by suggesting that only the first half be retained. The full song could aalways be sung in other contexts. Instead of understanding this, the PM stated that the Congress bent the knee to Muslims. In trying to score brownie points against the Congress , the PM unfortunately lost the fundamental purpose of the “discussion “. The importance of Vande Mataram was lost to the general public , who rely a lot on the PM’s words due to his popularity. For obvious reasons, Ms Lekhi has avoided mentioning this scooring of brownie points by the PM and has tried to dump the entire blame on the Congress for turning the discussion into a debate.