NEW DELHI: The row over the full rendition of Vande Mataram at the Congress headquarters on Independence Day acquired a Bankim Chandra connection on, with BJP’s Naihati MLA Sumitro Chatterjee, a direct descendant of the national song’s author, writing to Sonia Gandhi on Saturday and demanding an unconditional apology to the country, particularly West Bengal.The controversy erupted after a video from the Congress’s August 15 function showed Sonia gesturing and speaking to party president Mallikarjun Kharge while the full version of Vande Mataram was being sung. BJP leaders alleged she was trying to have the rendition stopped after the opening stanzas. Congress rejected the charge, saying Sonia was only asking that a chair be brought for Kharge, who had been standing for some time.In his letter in Hindi, Chatterjee said the episode had left him with “deep pain, emptiness and anguish”, alleging that Sonia’s “physical gestures” reflected “unease, impatience and repeated attempts to stop” the song. He said the reaction hurt him not only as a citizen but as a direct descendant of Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay.
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Invoking the song’s place in the freedom movement, Chatterjee referred to Sri Aurobindo, Khudiram Bose, Bipin Chandra Pal and Bal Gangadhar Tilak, and said generations of freedom fighters had rallied around Vande Mataram.“Vande Mataram is not the ancestral property of any political party. It is the collective memory of the nation, Bankim Chandra’s eternal legacy and a sacred national symbol sanctified by the blood and sacrifice of lakhs of martyrs,” he wrote.Chatterjee also pointed to the full six-stanza rendition in Lok Sabha on August 13, attended by leaders from both government and Opposition, and asked why there should be “hesitation and discomfort” over the same song at the Congress headquarters. He sought an “unconditional and public apology” from Sonia.