Whose motherland? 'vande mataram', Hindutva and the exclusion of pluralism
The recent controversy surrounding ‘Vande Mataram’, India’s national song, warrants a deeper examination beyond the song itself. It requires us to look at the historical context in which Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, the composer, wrote it, as well as to the historical backdrop against which it was subsequently promoted and, ultimately, why its full rendition has received legislative backing.
Beyond the immediate political dispute lies a larger question: how does the invocation of ‘Vande Mataram’ intersect with the patriarchal vision underpinning the RSS-BJP’s belief system, and what does this mean for India’s constitutional commitment to pluralism and equality?
The debate is ultimately not just about a song, but about who and what shapes the national identity, how loyalty is audited and what kind of nationhood is being imagined.
Bankim is celebrated as one of the early architects of Indian nationalism and was influential in shaping its intellectual imagination. However, his conception of the nation was deeply complex and exclusionary, profoundly shaped by Hindu religious and historical imagery.
The recurring motifs in his writings substantiate this argument. In Anandamath (1882), for instance, he invokes Hindu resistance to Muslim rulers as the basis of national pride, more often than not portraying Muslims as oppressive and Hindus as victims of historical subjugation.
Likewise, his deification of the motherland as a Hindu goddess –realised through allegories of Durga and Kali in ‘Vande Mataram’ – reveals how inextricably his idea of nationalism was intertwined with Hindu religiosity.
Paradoxically, Bankim regarded British rule as legitimate for much of his life and championed English education, while simultaneously exhibiting deep hostility towards medieval Muslim rule.
His legacy therefore embodies an enduring historical contradiction. Although he was a major influence on Indian nationalism, his vision of the nation was both powerful and profoundly structured by a communal binary. It was this fusion that prompted historian R.C. Majumdar to famously observe that Bankim had “converted patriotism into religion and religion into patriotism”.
Enforced compliance vs voluntary reverence
In a diverse and pluralistic country like India, national symbols must reflect its composite fabric. Any departure from this principle risks breeding communal estrangement, political ‘othering’ and social fragmentation. The recurring friction over ‘Vande Mataram’ exemplifies this fault line.
In Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, along with other political leaders, stood as the full version of the song was recently sung. Later, in what appeared to be a largely acquiescent defence, Abdullah argued that, irrespective of political or ideological differences, there was a parliamentary obligation to do so. Ironically, what might have been an expression of reverence became a question of compliance.
Conversely, in Congress-ruled Karnataka, the government has directed that only the first two stanzas of the song be sung at official state functions, essentially echoing the Congress Working Committee’s historic 1937 compromise. The BJP, meanwhile, has portrayed this as the Congress’s refusal to accord the national song its full honour, accusing the party of pursuing appeasement-driven politics and turning the issue into yet another political flashpoint.
The question, therefore, remains: when symbols are weaponised as litmus tests of national loyalty, the very foundations they stand on collapse. Instead of unity, it fosters division.
Gendered nationalism and the Hindutva matrix
In Anandamath, the purity, sacrifice and devotion of the Hindu woman are presented as indispensable to the survival of the motherland. As historian Tanika Sarkar observes, “the sati was an adored nationalist symbol,” embodying, for Bankim, the ultimate hope of a nation in decline. This ideal of the self-sacrificing Hindu woman is central to Anandamath, where the motherland is imagined through a sacred feminine figure whose purity and sacrifice signifies national regeneration.
This reflects what Partha Chatterjee identifies as the nationalist attempt to define women’s position through social and moral principles that would preserve the cultural identity of the nation. Consequently, Anandamath is seminal not merely for its anti-Muslim representations or its ambivalence toward colonial rule, but for fundamentally intertwining gendered morality with political nationalism, a lineage directly sustained in national debates through ‘Vande Mataram’.
Although the historical context may not allow a parallel, a similar logic can be traced to the contemporary Hindu nationalist discourse, particularly the politics surrounding the BJP and the wider Hindutva movement.
Here, the imagination of the Hindu nation remains deeply tied to subjective invocations of cultural tradition, familial hierarchy and moral order. Within this matrix, women are cast as the bearers and protectors of Hindu culture, rendering their autonomy, sexuality, matrimonial choices and family roles matters of wider community concern. The distinction between the “traditional” Hindu woman and the supposedly Westernised or ‘decadent’ woman likewise continues to appear in debates surrounding women’s dress, interfaith relationships, religious conversion and family life.
The structural affinity with Anandamath, therefore, lies in an enduring nationalist trope: the woman’s body becomes the ideological terrain upon which the boundaries of the nation are negotiated, where the idealisation of female sacrifice simultaneously glorifies womanhood and subordinates female agency to community control.
Seen through this prism, ‘Vande Mataram’ makes India metamorphosise into a divine mother goddess and the Hindus – when mobilised along the rightist ideas of Hindutva or enamored by RSS ideology – conceive themselves as children of that goddess. Within this broader mythic framework, the supposedly non-indigenous religions or cultures are construed as transgressors against the motherland.
It is precisely here that the architecture of hostility leads to psychological alienation and ‘otherisation’. Therefore, for Muslims, the struggle does not end with the song itself, but essentially extends into an existential question: not merely envisaging India as a mother goddess, but also of what her children will do to those whom they imagine to have wronged her.
The constitutional imperative
Our constitution is one of the most inclusive political documents ever written. The choice of words in Article 1 is significant, for it declares, “India, that is Bharat, shall be a Union of States.” The use of ‘Bharat’, while leaving out ‘Hindustan’, can be viewed in the context of the historical and linguistic associations attached to these names. Acknowledging both ‘Bharat’ and the historical resonance of ‘Hindustan’ might, in a similar vein, have reflected the plural character of Indian civilisation more comprehensively.
The same principle could perhaps have been applied to the question of national symbols. By limiting the use of ‘Vande Mataram’ to only its first two stanzas, the constitution-writers and the national leadership of the day consciously sought to avoid religious controversies surrounding the later stanzas.
In that spirit, an inclusive choice such as Allama Iqbal’s ‘Sarey Jahan Se Achcha’, with its emphasis on a shared Indian identity, might have had an even greater potential to bind the country together. The lesson here is that symbols intended to represent the nation must not merely celebrate its past; they must also make every section of its people feel equally represented.
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