Vande Mataram debate: Time for song’s unbiased evaluation, it was never anti-Islam, says Rajnath Singh

Urging for an unbiased evaluation of Vande Mataram and its history, Singh said while “everyone has heard the first two stanzas… many are not familiar with the rest. Most parts of the original version have been forgotten, and those stanzas depict the essence of India.”

Calling for a “return to the song’s glory”, Singh said the composition was “complete in itself”, but “there have been attempts to render it incomplete”.

Addressing criticism of Anand Math, Singh said some had targeted the novel as communal, which in turn cast a shadow on Vande Mataram. He argued that the context of the novel showed otherwise. “If we go back to that era, which Anand Math depicts, it becomes clear that the subject matter was not against any religion or sect. At that time, Bengal was suffering from a severe famine, and the Nawab of Bengal was collecting heavy land revenue from the starving population under pressure from the British. Anand Math was written against this injustice,” he said.

This, Singh said, made it clear Vande Mataram and Ana­nd Math “were never agai­nst Islam”, but “the cry of the com­mon people against the alliance of the Nawab of Bengal and British imperialism of that era”.

Later, during the same debate, he also accused the Opposition parties of undermining constitutional institutions by targeting the Election Commission. Singh said large-scale migration, deaths and rapid urbanisation caused distortions in electoral rolls, making exercises such as the SIR necessary to “purify the voters’ list”.