"Jana Gana Mana" is the national anthem of the Republic of India. It was originally composed as Bharoto Bhagyo Bidhata in Bengali by polymath Rabindranath Tagore on 11 December 1911. The first stanza of the song Bharoto Bhagyo Bidhata was adopted by the Constituent Assembly of India as the National Anthem on 24 January 1950. A formal rendition of the national anthem takes approximately 52 seconds. A shortened version consisting of the first and last lines is also staged occasionally. It was first publicly sung on 27 December 1911 at the Calcutta Session of the Indian National Congress.
Sheet music for "Jana Gana Mana"
Rabindranath Tagore, the author and composer of the national anthems of India and Bangladesh
Page 1 of Tagore's translation of "Jana Gana Mana" on 28 February 1919, at the Besant Theosophical College
Page 2 of Tagore's translation of "Jana Gana Mana" on 28 February 1919, at the Besant Theosophical College
A national anthem is a patriotic musical composition symbolizing and evoking eulogies of the history and traditions of a country or nation. The majority of national anthems are marches or hymns in style. American, Central Asian, and European nations tend towards more ornate and operatic pieces, while those in the Middle East, Oceania, Africa, and the Caribbean use a more simplistic fanfare. Some countries that are devolved into multiple constituent states have their own official musical compositions for them ; their constituencies' songs are sometimes referred to as national anthems even though they are not sovereign states.
Early version of the "Wilhelmus" as preserved in a manuscript of 1617 (Brussels, Royal Library, MS 15662, fol. 37v-38r)
Holographic copy of 1847 of Il Canto degli Italiani, the Italian national anthem since 1946
Rouget de Lisle performing "La Marseillaise" for the first time