Haripura was not merely another annual gathering of the Indian National Congress. In early 1938, Congress assembled there in Gujarat for its 51st Annual Session after the Congress Working Committee meeting in Calcutta in October 1937. And in those intervening months, much had changed in the way Vande Mataram was to be seen, heard and presented.

The ceremonial journey of the young President-elect Subhas Chandra Bose to the Congress pavilion became a spectacle of political imagination. For a four-mile journey from Haripura, Bose was carried to the pandal, curated by Nandalal  Bose, in a magnificent rath. It was drawn by 51 bullocks. Richly caparisoned, their horns painted, the bullocks moved in pairs, each pair carrying tricolour flags upon their heads. And around their necks hung tuned bells. They were Vande Mataram bells with engraved letters.

Bose reached the session with singers and musicians who had travelled with him from Calcutta in the second-class bogies of the Nagpur Mail. RR Mukherjee was the master musician. As the Bengal troupe sang Vande Mataram, the senior leadership of the Congress, including Mahatma Gandhi, stood in attention. Sarojini Naidu found the Haripura Vande Mataram ‘exquisitely’ sung, with ‘deep and thrilling emotions’. Kamaladevi........

© Indian Express