In Uttar Pradesh, some councilors are accused of insulting the national song Vande Mataram at a municipal council meeting in Muzaffarnagar. A video of the national song Vande Mataram being sung in the meeting has gone viral in which it is seen that four burqa-clad women corporators kept sitting while all the other members in the house were standing in honour of the national song.
Netizens have called it an insult to the national song. Interestingly, Union Minister for Animal Husbandry, Dairy, and Fisheries Sanjeev Balyan was also present at the meeting. He is the elected Lok Sabha member from the Muzaffarnagar constituency.
The meeting, held at the municipal auditorium in the afternoon on Saturday, June 18, 2022, was also attended by Kapil Dev Agarwal, minister of vocational education and skill development in the Uttar Pradesh government. He has also been the chairman of Muzaffarnagar municipality in the past. This incident happened in presence of several other senior officials as well.
In the meeting, where a resolution of Rs.196 crore for the development of the city was passed, the entire House, apart from these 4 members, stood in honour of the national song ‘Vande Mataram’. The members of the house also seemed unhappy with this act. The national song was played before the proceedings began.
Union Minister Sanjeev Balyan advised everyone to respect the national anthem and the national song. The councilors also discussed this. The Union Minister said that if a woman will insult the national song, how will she strengthen the society?
It is notable that a case regarding giving the same status to the national song as that of that national anthem is underway in the court. In the last week of May 2022, the Delhi High Court also sought the opinion of the central government in this regard.
Bharatiya Janata Party leader and advocate Ashwini Upadhyay has filed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) on this issue. He said that due to the absence of any guidelines on the national song, it is being used in an indecent manner and it is being insulted in films and parties also.
In his petition, he has said, “On January 24, 1950, Dr. Rajendra Prasad, chairman of the Constituent Assembly, had said that the song ‘Vande Mataram’ had played a historic role in the struggle for Indian independence and would be honored equally with ‘Jana-Gana-Mana’.” Upadhyay has essentially asked for playing both – the national anthem as well as the national song – in all the institutions.