In recent weeks, the horrific child deaths in a Gorakhpur hospital, apparently owing to a lack of oxygen cylinder supplies, has inevitably led to finger pointing in all directions. The Uttar Pradesh government has squarely put the onus on the hospital authorities, at the same time muddying the waters by stating that the deaths were due to the rampant spread of encephalitis. We know that, but the moot point is did the lack of oxygen cylinders exacerbate the situation? The hospital promptly shifted the blame on to the cylinder suppliers, who returned the compliment by stating that their bills have remained unpaid, hence the interruption in supplies. To this self perpetuating cycle of recriminations, we in India have come up with our own expression for this ping pong blame game - ‘tu tu, main main’, correctly understood by all, cutting across linguistic factions.
As usual, every single news channel on television took the elevated moral ground, and went stomping about in high dudgeon, putting ministers on the mat, demanding explanations which proved beyond the limited capabilities of most of the government and hospital functionaries. We had now entered ‘open season’ territory, with the media and the opposition parties finding a ready victim ripe for flagellation, and thonged whips to flay them with.
‘The Nation Wants to Know’. Which, under the tragic circumstances, would have been understandable, but our channels won’t just stop there. They had to keep reminding us, every few seconds, that it was ‘our channel’ that got to the hospital first with ‘our cameras and crew’, it was ‘us’ that thrust ‘our’ prying lenses first on the bedridden dying babies (faces artfully blurred), ‘our’ channel that garnered 300% more viewership between 8 and 9 pm when the Gorakhpur crisis had reached, literally, fever pitch, and ‘our news channel’ that received gadzillion tweets, and still counting. To which I can only respond in the acclaimed manner of Rhett Butler (Clark Gable) from Gone With The Wind, ‘Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn’. Or in present day parlance, ‘Who gives a $@#&?’
Moving on to a less unpleasant subject, but idiosyncratic nevertheless, the whole country seems to be in a bit of a tizzy over being told that we must all know and sing Bankim Chandra Chatterjee’s Vande Mataram, whenever called upon to do so. The whys and wherefores are not relevant. ‘Ours not to reason why, ours but to do and die’, in the ringing words of Alfred Lord Tennyson. Once again, our indefatigable news channels on television have been fiercely ‘debating’ this subject, which has somehow become a communal cause celebre. There was this hilarious incident in one of the channels, when a ruling party member was asked to recite the lines from Vande Mataram, and was clearly unable to do so. As to knowing the meaning of the words, the esteemed functionary was plainly out of his depth. And who can blame him? It’s about as much as we can manage to get our cricketers to mime in lip-sync when the National Anthem, ‘Jana Gana Mana’ is played.
So where exactly does Vande Mataram fit into the scheme of things? In 1950, the first two verses of the song were declared the national song of the Republic of India, as distinct from the national anthem. How do ordinary citizens like us come to grips with this puzzling juxtaposition of Vande Mataram with Jana Gana Mana? When is the one appropriate vis-a-vis the other, and when not? Questions, questions. The framers of our constitution should have thought about all this, prepared a proper manual of instructions for the benefit of its citizens and to guide some of its bumbling representatives, many of whom were clearly red-faced when asked probing questions on the subject. Hardly anyone I know was able to go beyond the first line, and those who fancied their singing voices, tended to warble to the tune of the A.R. Rehman interpretation. A fitting tribute to the irony and ecstasy of communal harmony! The problem is that the latter half of the song is a Sanskritised tongue twister, and those not to the manner bo
rn, are going to find themselves lyrically challenged.
I don’t mind admitting that even after listening to the traditional and pristine M.S. Subbulakshmi rendition several times, and to the less satisfying, zippier Lata Mangeshkar version (set to a different tune altogether), I still cannot, for the life of me, get my vocal chords round the lyrics. Throw A.R. Rehman’s tune into the mix, and you are grappling with a quandary, namely, which Vande Mataram to sing from this hodge podge medley. Assuming we can memorise the words in the first place. Once again, ‘The Nation Wants to Know’. It is not clear if one should sit back and admire the nation’s insatiable thirst for knowledge, or agonise over its collective lack of the same.
Enough of beating round the bush. Let’s get to the crux of the matter. Forget about the nation, I want to know the lyrics of Vande Mataram, a true blue Indian patriotic song, who composed it and when, and every other arcane detail most of our citizens are blissfully unaware of. To satisfy my curiosity, who do I turn to for enlightenment? The American search engine Google, silly. And here are those verses for our contemplation.
vande mataram / sujalaa suphalaa / malayajaaatalam / aasya ayamalaamataram / vande mataramaubhra jyotsnam / pulakita yaminam / phulla kusumita/ drumadalaaobhinam /suhasinaasumadhura bhaaiaam / sukhadaa varadaa / mataram / vande mataram
As I must strictly adhere to my word limit on this piece, I shan’t embark on a word for word translation. Suffice it to say that there’s a lot of uplifting stuff about Mother, streams, fields, winds, moonlight, trees, kissing Mother’s feet, and more in similar vein. The words Mother and Nation are freely interchangeable.
All of which still leaves me in a state of befuddlement as to why we need a National Anthem and a National Song, much less their specific roles in the overall scheme of things. And I haven’t even started on Sare Jahan se Acchha. If you, dear reader, are better informed, kindly let us have the benefit of your superior wisdom.
(The author is a brand consultant with an interest in music, cricket and good humour)
