सुप्रीम कोर्ट: धार्मिक कारणों से वंदे मातरम् के सभी पद न गाने पर दण्ड नहीं

No criminal action against those not singing all stanzas of ‘Vande Mataram’: Supreme Court

Musician TM Krishna's petition challenged the constitutional validity of the 2026 amendment to the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971, which extended penal protection to the National Song.

Synopsis: The Supreme Court further sought the Union Government’s response to the writ petition. Carnatic musician TM Krishna contended that the stanzas in question contained explicit references to Hindu deities, including Durga, Lakshmi and Saraswati. He argued that compelling citizens to sing them amounted to compelled religious and ideological affirmation, contrary to the Constitution’s secular character.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday, 22 September, orally observed that a person who does not sing all the stanzas of Vande Mataram for religious reasons will not face penal consequences.

Hearing a writ petition by Carnatic musician TM Krishna, a Bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant, Justice Joymala Bagchi and Justice V Mohana said the court was not within its remit to decide the National Song. The Bench added that the legal principle laid down in the 1986 Bijoe Emmanuel case applies here as well, LiveLaw reported.

Krishna’s petition challenged the constitutional validity of the 2026 amendment to the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971, which extended penal protection to the National Song. The petitioner also challenged the Ministry of Home Affairs’ directive to sing the complete six stanzas of the song at official functions.

The Supreme Court further sought the Union Government’s response to the writ petition. Krishna contended that the stanzas in question contained explicit references to Hindu deities, including Durga, Lakshmi and Saraswati. He argued that compelling citizens to sing them amounted to compelled religious and ideological affirmation, contrary to the Constitution’s secular character.

The amended law made it punishable with imprisonment of up to three years, a fine, or both, to intentionally prevent the singing of the National Anthem or National Song, or to disturb an assembly engaged in such singing.

“In consequence and in effect, the Impugned State Action does not merely regulate national protocol or prescribe a uniform code of conduct for public functions. It compels a ceremony of assent to a symbol whose last four stanzas, Stanzas 3 to 6, are expressly devotional, deity-invoking and non-secular,” contended the plea.

The plea challenged the measures under Articles 14 (equality), 15(1) (protection against discrimination), 19(1)(a) (freedom of speech and expression), 21 (life and personal liberty) and 25(1) (freedom of conscience and religion).

Krishna contended that the criminal penalty makes the issue fundamentally different from a mere protocol governing national functions.

“By mandating the rendition of all six stanzas under penal sanction, the State transforms what is unquestionably a contested historical symbol into a compelled orthodoxy,” the plea submitted.

The petitioner extensively relied on the Supreme Court’s 1986 judgment in Bijoe Emmanuel v. State of Kerala—the judgment protected schoolchildren, who conscientiously declined to sing the National Anthem.

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