A recent controversy over who the Indian national anthem was written for has obscured something far more vital and precious. India’s anthem, like those of its neighbors, is a lyrical celebration of attachment to a homeland and a culture rather than a nation in competition with other nations.
South Asia is one of the few clusters of countries where all the national anthems are non-militaristic. It is no accident that three of these anthems – Indian, Bangladeshi and Sri Lankan – are written by the same poet, Rabindranath Tagore.
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