Bharat Mata
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
|
This article contains Indic text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks or boxes, misplaced vowels or missing conjuncts instead of Indic text. |
Bhārat Mātā (Hindi, from Sanskrit भारत माता, Bhārata Mātā), Mother India, or Bhāratāmbā (from अंबा ambā 'mother') is the national personification of India as a mother goddess. She is usually depicted as a woman clad in an orange or saffron sari holding a flag, and sometimes accompanied by a lion.
The image of Bharat Mata formed with the Indian independence movement of the late 19th century. A play by Kiran Chandra Bandyopadhyay, Bhārat Mātā, was first performed in 1873. Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay's 1882 novel Anandamath introduced the hymn "Vande Mataram" which soon became the song of the emerging freedom movement in India. Abanindranath Tagore portrayed Bharat Mata as a four-armed Hindu goddess wearing saffron colored robes, holding a book, sheaves of rice, a mala, and a white cloth.
In 1936, a Bharat Mata temple was built in Benaras by Shiv Prashad Gupt and was inaugurated by Mohandas Gandhi. Mahatma Gandhi said, "I hope this temple, which will serve as a cosmopolitan platform for people of all religions, castes, and creeds including Harijans, will go a great way in promoting religious unity, peace, and love in the country."[citation needed]
As the conception of Bharat Mata predates the partition of India, she is intended as representing "Aryavarta", the motherland of Hinduism in Hindu nationalism, not restricted to the secular Republic of India, and Bharat Mata remains a symbol of the "vision of a unified motherland" in Hindu nationalist irredentism. A Bharat Mata temple in Haridwar was built by in 1983 by Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP).[1]
The depiction of India as a Hindu goddess implies that it is not just the patriotic but also the religious duty of all Indians[2] to participate in the nationalist struggle to defend the nation.[3]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Lise McKean, 'Bharat Mata: Mother India and Her Militant Matriots' in: John Stratton Hawley, Donna M. Wulff (eds.) Devī: goddesses of India, Motilal Banarsidass, 1998, ISBN 9788120814912, p. 250-280.
- ^ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0rCKyEa4uk
- ^ Kalyani Devaki Menon, Everyday Nationalism: Women of the Hindu Right in India: The Ethnography of Political Violence, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009, ISBN 9780812241969, p. 89f.
- David Kinsley, Hindu Goddesses: Vision of the Divine Feminine in the Hindu Religious Traditions (ISBN 81-208-0379-5)[year needed][page needed]
[edit] External links
- Patriotic fervour The Hindu, August 17, 2003.
- The life and times of Bharat Mata Sadan Jha, Manushi, Issue 142.
- Bharat Mata Images Prof. Pritchett, Columbia University