Hemanta adapted the national song

Vande Mataram was penned by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay and declared India’s national song.

The immortal hymn was published in the Bengali novel Anandamath, which was written by Chattopadhyay in 1882.

Anand Math, the cinematic adaptation of the novel, released in 1952. It featured two versions of the song – a female version (by Lata Mangeshkar) and a male version (by a debutant named Hemant Kumar Mukhopadhyay, who would also go on to be credited as Hemanta Mukherjee or Hemant Kumar).

This blog features only the latter, which also marked Kumar's debut as a Hindi film composer.