What is the official national anthem of India, composed by Rabindranath Tagore?

India’s official national anthem, composed by Rabindranath Tagore, is “Jana Gana Mana.”

Tagore wrote the Bengali song in 1911, and it was first publicly performed at the Indian National Congress session in Calcutta that year. The original composition contains five stanzas, but India’s official anthem uses a shortened version of the first stanza.

The Constituent Assembly adopted “Jana Gana Mana” as India’s national anthem on 24 January 1950, shortly before the country became a republic. Its Hindi and Bengali wording praises India’s geographic and cultural unity.

“Vande Mataram,” also written during India’s independence movement, has a separate status as the national song. Confusing the national anthem with the national song is one of the most common facts people mix up about India’s patriotic music.