Assam’s Silchar residents sing Amaar sonar Bangla to protest BJP’s ‘seditious’ tag

Scores of residents of southern Assam’s Silchar collectively sang Amaar sonar Bangla, aami tomay bhalobashi on Thursday (November 6, 2025) evening to protest the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government’s alleged theory that singing this patriotic song was “seditious”.

The song, penned by Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore in 1905 to protest the partition of Bengal, was later adopted by Bangladesh as its national anthem. Translated, the song means: “My beloved Bengal, I love you.”

Several intellectuals, members of NGOs and cultural groups gathered at the base of the statue of freedom fighter Khudiram Bose in the heart of Silchar town to “send a message to Delhi via Dispur (seat of power in Assam) that we are proud of Rabindra Sangeet (body of songs composed by Tagore) and will sing his songs, come what may.”

A controversy erupted after Bidhu Bhushan Das, a septuagenarian Congress Seva Dal member in Sribhumi district, was booked for singing Amaar sonar Bangla at a party event on October 29. Referring to videos of this event posted on social media platforms, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma slammed Congress for encouraging the singing of the “Bangladesh national anthem” in India.

Mr. Das was subsequently booked for sedition.

Immigration politics

Anything associated with Bangladesh is touchy in Assam, where politics usually revolve around the “Bangladeshi” or “illegal immigrants” issue and the perceived demographic threat because of “large-scale influx”.

Former Vice Chancellor of Assam University, Tapodhir Bhattacharjee, said the song found “seditious” by the BJP should be sung proudly as a tribute to Tagore and to underline the shared cultural identity of Bengalis.

“If a song penned by Tagore 66 years before the birth of Bangladesh can be objectionable, the same yardstick should be applied to Sindh mentioned in the Indian national anthem, as it refers to a province now in Pakistan,” Mohitosh Paul of the Barak Valley Blood Donors’ Forum said.

Tagore composed Jana gana mana, India’s national anthem, in 1911.

The protestors also panned the BJP for “adding insult to injury” after a Delhi police letter referred to Bengali as a “Bangladeshi language”.