Replace Sindh with Northeast: Congress MP moves resolution in Parliament to amend National Anthem

March 16, 2018 224 Views No Comment

The Northeast is cut off from the rest of the country in more ways than one, says Congress MP Ripun Bora. For instance, the region does not find mention in the National Anthem, a grouse that Rajya Sabha MP Bora has now taken to Parliament.

Ripun Bora today moved a private member’s resolution in Rajya Sabha demanding that the word “Sindh” be removed and instead the phrase “Uttar Purv” (Northeast) be added to the National Anthem.

“When Rabindranath Tagore wrote the Anthem in 1911, he did not envisage that Sindh would one day be a foreign country. It is now part of Pakistan. This anomaly must go,” Bora told India Today.

The resolution moved by the Congress MP says, “The then President of India, Dr Rajendra Prasad, had made a statement in the Constituent Assembly on January 24, 1950 that the composition consisting of the words and music known as Jana Gana Mana is the National Anthem of India, subject to such alterations in the words as the government may authorise as occasion arises”.

The resolution further says, “This House urges upon the government to amend the National Anthem to delete the word “Sindh” and replace it with the words “Northeast India” in the National Anthem”.

While the move by the Congress MP Ripun Bora would be music to the Northeast’s ears, it may not go down well with the mandarins in the South Block.

Sindh, the largest province in Pakistan which shares its borders with Rajasthan and Gujarat, has a sizeable Hindu population. Successive governments in Sindh have accused India of trying to foment trouble and rake up pro-Independence forces in the region.

Ripun Bora’s resolution did not come up for discussion today with the House being adjourned. The resolution may pass scrutiny in Parliament but not in the South Block.

Source: India Today