President Murmu assents to Vande Mataram Bill

President Droupadi Murmu on Tuesday gave assent to the Vande Mataram Bill, granting the national song the same legal protection as the national anthem, Jana Gana Mana. The Bill has now become a law.

Parliament passed the Prevention of Insults to National Honour (Amendment) Bill, 2026, last month, amending the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971. The legislation seeks to give Vande Mataram the same statutory protection as the national anthem.

With the President’s assent, the bill has become a law. Now, such offences are punishable with imprisonment up to three years, a fine, or both.

Earlier, the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act prohibited intentionally preventing the singing of the national anthem (Jana Gana Mana) or causing disturbance to any assembly engaged in such singing.

These offences were punishable by up to three years’ imprisonment, a fine, or both, while a second and every subsequent conviction attracted a minimum of one year’s imprisonment. The erstwhile law did not accord the same protection for the national song.

“Presently, there is no specific legal provision to prevent insults to the singing of ‘Vande Mataram’, which is honoured as the national song. Therefore, to prohibit any person from intentionally preventing the singing of the national song or causing disturbance to any assembly engaged in such singing, it is proposed to amend Section 3 of the said Act to include the national song also within its ambit, to make such acts punishable,” the Bill had said.

The president of the Constituent Assembly, Dr Rajendra Prasad, on January 24, 1950, stated that the song ‘Vande Mataram’ composed by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, which played a historic role in the Indian freedom struggle, shall be honoured equally with the national anthem ‘Jana Gana Mana’ and shall have equal status with it, the Bill further said.

For the first time at the Independence Day function, Vande Mataram will be sung from the ramparts of the Red Fort this year.

Earlier this year, the Union Home Ministry directed that all six stanzas of ‘Vande Mataram’ shall be sung first when the national song and the national anthem are played together.

In an order dated January 28, the home ministry gave the first set of protocols for singing the national song, directing that six stanzas of it, having a duration of 3 minutes and 10 seconds, shall be sung at official functions such as the arrival of the president, unfurling of the national flag, and speeches of governors.

“When the national song and the national anthem are sung or played, the national song will be sung or played first,” the order read. The assembly where the national song is sung shall stand in attention, it said.