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Pt. Vishnu
Digambar Paluskar founded the Gandharva
Mahavidhyalaya. A well- known musician, he was
also a proud patriot. He brought into vogue the
tradition of singing national songs at public
functions. In the dawn of the Swedeshi movement,
he started the tradition of singing Vande Mataram
in Lahore, and carried it to different parts of
the country. He commanded not only immense
scholarship, but a magnetic personality and a
wonderful voice. He was regarded with great
respect by the national leaders of the freedom
movement. It was their desire that he should sing
Vande Mataram at the commencement of every
Congress session. Paluskar attended Congress
session, year after year, since 1915, and his
performance captured the hearts of delegates.
In 1923 the
Congress session was held at Kakinada, which is
now in Andhra Pradesh. As usual Paluskar was
invited to it. He rose to sing Vande Mataram.
Maulana Mohamed Ali was the President of the
Congress that year.
"When Vishnu
Digambar rose to sing Vande Mataram in conformity
with tradition, Maulana Saheb raised an objection
on the ground that music was taboo to his
religion. The leaders assembled were completely
bewildered. Vishnu Digambar was incensed, and hit
back: 'This is a national forum, not the
plateform of any single community. This is no
mosque to object to music. There is no
justification for a ban on music here. When the
President could put up with the music in the
presidential procession, why does he object to it
here?' Having silenced the President, without
waiting for his reply, he proceeded to sing Vande
Mataram and completed it. Respect for his sense
of national pride and love of the motherland
grew. The people admired his moral courage, and
applauded him heartily." (Vishnu Digambar
Paluskar, National Book Trust, p.54)
It came as a
great shock to the people that Maulana Md. Ali
should object the singing of Vande Mataram. There
was no doubt that this was an indication of a
mentality of separatism which refused to identify
itself with the mainstream of national life. But
this episode did little damage either to the
greatness or the popularity of the song. Mahatma
Gandhi repeatedly referred to the virtues of this
national anthem. "When we sing that ode to
the motherland, Bande Mataram, we sing it to the
whole of India." (Kesari January 1924)
The
opposition of Muslim League to Vande Mataram,
however, continued to wax and they started
putting pressure on Congress leadership against
the singing of this song. It was the height of
irony on the part of the Muslim League, which was
bent upon breaking the unity of India,
emotionally, geographically, and in all other
ways, to express its concern about 'the growth of
genuine natinalism'. Those in Congress who were
eager to pander to every slightest wish of the
League were agitated, and a feeling developed
that unless Muslim League is dissatisfied
and it was won over the unity of the country
would be imperilled. In such a situation
CWC in 1937 decided to maim and curtail the
national song.
The CWC
appointed a sub-committee with Maulana Azad,
Nehru, Subhash Chandra Bose and Acharya Narendra
Dev as members to review the eligibility of Vande
Mataram to the status of national anthem. The
committee was to take the guidance of
Rabindranath Tagore. And this sub-committee
endorsed the CWC's resolution to adopt Vande
Mataram in its truncated form as the
national anthem:
"Anandmath
was the story of a heroic struggle against
foreign rule. Because it happened to be a Muslim
rule, a fresh objection was raised. Bankim's
object was to arouse through his novels a
patriotic awakening among the people so that they
became consious of their slavery under the
British. He couldn't do it overtly, but his
fiction achieved the purpose. The revolutinaries
of
Bengal
accepted it in this spirit in the early part of
the century; it bacame the mantra of those who
mounted the gallows in a bid to emanicipate the
country from alien bondage...The Congress,
however, in order to conciliate the Muslims,
mutilated the song and ordered that only first
two stanzas of it should be sung." (Muslim
Politics, S. Mukherjee, p.53)
But Muslim
League continued its campaign to dethrone even
the first two stanzas of the Vande Mataram. In
the lagislative assemblies they would boycott the
singing of the song or raise point of orders or
bring adjournment motions etc. and would make a
plea that 'singing of Vande Mataram is a
declaration of war on Islam.' To appease them in
Madras assembly from January 28, 1938, the
practice of reciting from the Qiran and a prayer
in English was also introduced. But Muslim League
was not satisfied, it continued to demand the
deletion of Vande Mataram from national
movement, and to this effect it passed a
resolution (Pirpur Report, Nov.15, 1938) which
listed numerous grievences of the Muslims, Vande
Mataram song had topped the list. |
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