'Vande Mataram' optional for LF govt in Bengal

Kolkata, Sep 2 (UNI) The Marxist government in West Bengal has no intention of making the singing of 'Vande Mataram' compulsory on September 7 to commemorate the centenary of the national song.

''We will not like to impose it and create problems for others.

Those who wish to can sing it,'' School Education Minister Partha De said here today.

The minister said the state would not like to create a controversy on the issue.

Incidentally, Bengal prides itself for giving the country the national anthem 'Jana Gana Mana' penned by Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore and 'Vande Mataram' written in 1875 by the celebrated Bengali novelist Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyaya.

This song was first accepted as the national song at the Varanasi session of the Congress on September 7, 1905.

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