UNION Home Minister Amit Shah on Sunday accused the Congress of insulting the national song ‘Vande Mataram’ and demanded that the party apologise to the people and to Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay who wrote the song. Addressing a public meeting in Chittorgarh, Shah alleged that during the Independence Day programme at the Congress headquarters, party leader Sonia Gandhi asked Vande Mataram to be stopped midway through the song. Referring to the Independence Day celebrations held on Saturday, Shah said after 80 years of Independence, Vande Mataram was sung at the Red Fort and all other places where flag hoisting was held. “Thousands of people faced bullets and lathis and were jailed for singing Vande Mataram,” Shah said, referring to use of the revolutionary slogan during the freedom struggle. He alleged that during the Independence Day programme at the Congress headquarters, Sonia Gandhi had asked the party president to stop the song midway.

 

“We all saw it on television,” Shah said, adding that Sonia Gandhi should apologise to the people and to Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay’s immortal soul. “If there is any shame left, you should fold your hands and apologise to Bankim Babu’s immortal spirit and the people,” he said. BANKIM CHANDRA’S DESCENDANT SEEKS SONIA GANDHI’S APOLOGY OVER ‘VANDE MATARAM’ ROW: Sumitro Chatterjee, BJP MLA and a direct descendant of Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, has sought an unconditional apology from Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson Sonia Gandhi over an alleged incident at the AICC headquarters on Independence Day. In a letter to Gandhi, Chatterjee said the alleged incident on August 15, as the country celebrated its 80th Independence Day, was “not merely unfortunate but a shameless repetition of a historical mistake.” Chatterjee, the BJP MLA from Naihati, said he was writing as an ordinary citizen, a patriot, expressing “deep pain, emptiness, and anger” over the episode.