Jammu, August 20: Senior BJP leader and former minister Bali Bhagat on Thursday launched a blistering attack on the Congress over its decision to follow its 1937 position of singing only the first two stanzas of Vande Mataram at party programmes, accusing it of reviving the politics of appeasement pursued by the pre-Partition Muslim League.
“The abbreviation INC no longer reflects the Congress’s politics. It should rename itself the ‘Indian Muslim League Congress’ or simply the ‘Jinnah Congress’. After restricting Vande Mataram, perhaps the only thing left for the party is to embrace the Constitution of Pakistan,” Bhagat said.
Bhagat said the controversy was not merely about the length of a song but about what he called the Congress’s “habitual surrender before divisive and communal politics.”
“Vande Mataram was not an ordinary composition. It became the battle cry of countless freedom fighters who faced British bullets, imprisonment and the gallows. Dividing or restricting such a sacred symbol to satisfy a political vote bank is an insult to the sacrifices that secured India’s freedom,” he said.
Drawing a historical parallel, Bhagat said the Congress had accepted separate electorates under the 1916 Lucknow Pact, while the Muslim League subsequently moved towards the Two-Nation Theory and adopted the Lahore Resolution in 1940, demanding separate Muslim-majority states. He also referred to the violence surrounding Direct Action Day in 1946, arguing that repeated concessions to separatist politics ultimately contributed to Partition.
“The Muslim League began with demands presented as safeguards, but those demands ultimately culminated in the bloody Partition of India. Congress must explain why, even after nearly nine decades, it continues to cling to a decision taken in an atmosphere dominated by communal pressure,” Bhagat said.
He alleged that restricting the National Song reflected the same political mindset that, in his words, “placed appeasement above national unity and electoral calculations above civilisational pride.”
“Today, it is Vande Mataram. Tomorrow, will Congress question other national symbols because someone finds them politically inconvenient? A party that repeatedly compromises with India’s identity cannot lecture the country on patriotism or constitutional values,” the former minister asserted.
Bhagat said Congress leaders might attempt to defend their decision through selective interpretations of history, but the people of India would judge it by its present political message.
“The question is simple: why is Congress uncomfortable with singing Vande Mataram in its entirety? Why does every debate involving India’s cultural and national identity push the party back towards appeasement?” he asked.
Bhagat further alleged that the latest decision had removed the remaining distinction between the Congress’s politics and that of the erstwhile Muslim League.
“The Congress must choose between the legacy of those who proclaimed Vande Mataram while fighting colonial rule and the politics of Muhammad Ali Jinnah that divided the motherland. It cannot claim both,” he said.
The senior BJP leader called upon Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi and the entire CWC to withdraw the decision and apologise to the nation.
“India will never accept another ideological Partition. Vande Mataram represents an undivided national spirit, and no party has the moral right to cut that spirit into pieces for votes,” Bhagat concluded.
