History of "Jana Gana Mana"

The poem was first recited publicly on the second day of the Indian National Congress annual session on 27 December 1911 in Calcutta ( now Kolkata). Then, it was followed at the annual event of the Adi Brahmo Samaj on January 1912, but it was largely unknown except for the readers of the Adi Brahmo Samaj newspaper, Tattwabodhini Patrika. The poem was published in the Tatwabodhini Patrika on February 1905 under the title Bharat Bhagya Bidhata which was the official Brahmo Samaj publication with Tagore then the Publisher.In 1912, Sarala Devi Chowdhurani, Tagore's niece, and a group of school students performed the song in front of prominent members of Congress such as Bishan Narayan Dhar, president of the Indian National Congress, and Ambika Charan Majumdar.

The song was first sung by the bard himself outside of Calcutta at a session at Besant Theosophical College in Madanapalle, Andhra Pradesh on 28 February 1919 when Tagore visited college and sang the song. The song enthralled the college students, while Margaret Cousins, then college vice-principal (also an expert in European music and Irish poet James Cousins' wife), both asked Tagore to create an English translation of the song and set the musical notation to the national anthem, which is only followed when the song is sung in the original slow style of interpretation.Tagore translated the work into English while taking the title The Morning Song of India at college on 28 February 1919. The college adopted Tagore 's translation of the song as their song of prayer that is sung until today.

Subhas Chandra Bose chose the song as national anthem when he was in Germany. Jana Gana Mana was first performed as the national anthem of an independent India by the Hamburg Radio Symphony Orchestra on the occasion of the founding meeting of the German-Indian Society on September 11, 1942 at the Hotel Atlantic in Hamburg.

"Jana Gana Mana" was heard in the 1945 film Hamrahi before it officially became India's national anthem in 1950. It was also adopted in 1935 as a school song by The Doon School, Dehradun.

On the occasion of India's attainment of freedom, the Indian Constituent Assembly assembled as a sovereign body for the first time on 14 August 1947, midnight, and the session closed with Jana Gana Mana's unanimous performance.

The members of the Indian Delegation to the United Nations General Assembly held in New York in 1947 provided a recording of Jana Gana Mana as the national anthem for the country. The house orchestra performed the song in front of a crowd consisting of delegates from around the world.