One hundred and fifty-one years after a Bengali novelist put pen to paper and changed the course of a nation's conscience, Odisha Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi marked the anniversary of Vande Mataram on 7 November 2026, calling the timeless composition a living pillar of India's cultural identity and the 'Nation First' ideal.

Writing in Odia, CM Majhi offered heartfelt greetings to all on what he described as the glorious completion of Vande Mataram's anniversary, tracing the song's composition to 7 November 1875, when Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay — reverentially addressed as Rishi (sage) — first gave it form. 'This eternal song,' he wrote, 'inspired millions of freedom fighters to dedicate everything for the liberation of the motherland.'

From Anandamath to the national conscience

Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay composed Vande Mataram in 1875 and later wove it into his landmark novel Anandamath. The Constituent Assembly formally adopted it as India's national song in 1950, alongside Jana Gana Mana. For the decades that followed, it remained a charged symbol — recited at protests, sung at school assemblies, and invoked at the first note of dawn broadcasts. Majhi underlined that across a 'century and a half,' the song has stood as a firm pillar of cultural heritage, national integrity, and the ideal of placing the nation above all else.

Majhi's charge of past political 'appeasement'

The Chief Minister did not stop at tribute. He said past attempts had been made — driven by 'narrow political interests and an appeasement mentality' — to limit the song's true glory, calling it an injustice to national self-respect. The remark, though framed historically, carries pointed political weight: BJP leaders have long argued that Vande Mataram was deliberately marginalised in earlier decades. The research background flags this claim as unverified in the public record, and NationPress reports it as the CM's stated position, not established fact.

Panch Pran as the new frame for Vande Mataram

Majhi linked the anniversary directly to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Panch Pran — the five resolutions for a developed India that Modi announced on 15 August 2022 from the ramparts of the Red Fort. Those five pledges — a developed India by 2047, freedom from a colonial mindset, pride in heritage, national unity, and duties of citizens — have since become a rhetorical scaffolding for BJP governments at the Centre and in the states. Majhi framed Vande Mataram as the cultural soul of that larger nation-building compact, arguing that under Modi's 'visionary leadership,' India has shed symbols of servitude and reclaimed its cultural pride.

He closed with a call to collective resolve: 'Let us together dedicate ourselves to the progress and service of the motherland and take the country to new heights on the world stage.' The post ended with the rallying cry — Vande Mataram! Bharat Mata Ki Jai! — and the hashtags #VandeMataram and #NationFirst.

One song, 151 years old, still setting the terms of India's political conversation — that, more than any anniversary greeting, is the headline.