Manipur BJP stages protest outside Congress Bhavan over disrespect to national song

The Manipur BJP on Sunday staged a demonstration in front of the Congress Bhavan in Imphal to protest against Sonia Gandhi’s alleged “objection” to singing of the full version of ‘Vande Mataram’ during an Independence Day event in New Delhi.

More than 50 BJP workers, holding the national flag and posters of Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, the song’s writer, raised slogans and played ‘Vande Mataram’ on loudspeakers outside the Congress Bhavan.

“The Congress disrespected the national song. We are staging a protest against that. Speaking or moving when the national song is being sung is highly disrespectful,” Manipur BJP general secretary K Sarat Kumar Singh told reporters here.

Security was heightened in the area to prevent any untoward incident, officials said. The BJP has accused former Congress chief Sonia Gandhi of objecting to the singing of the full version of ‘Vande Mataram’ at an Independence Day event at the opposition party’s headquarters in the national capital on Saturday.

However, the Congress denied the charge, asserting that there was no attempt to stop the singing of the full version of the national song, and that Gandhi was only asking for a chair for party chief Mallikarjun Kharge, as he was standing for quite some time.

Last month, Parliament passed a bill that makes any insult to the national song a punishable offence. The Prevention of Insults to National Honour (Amendment) Bill, 2026, was passed by a voice vote in the Lok Sabha on July 30, a day after it was approved by the Rajya Sabha.

The law grants status to ‘Vande Mataram’ on par with the National Anthem, ‘Jana Gana Mana’.