Today neither it's 15th of August, nor 26th January; not even Holi or Diwali. It's just an elongated holiday that I am enjoying and the break has given me an opportunity to bring some age old memories.
Here is a song which was originally written by a Bengali I.A.S. officer named Dwijendralal Ray (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwijendralal_Ray) in British India. As a child I heard this from the mouth of my mother as well as grand mother and ever since it remained as my all time favourite patriotic song. Again this is the song which compelled me to return to my motherland some 10 years down the line rejecting the U.K. citizenship. Even today it brings tears to my eyes.
I hope you would enjoy it too.
Original Bengali song - "Dhana dhanya pushpa bhara, aamader ei bashundhara..." - Dwijendralal Ray
Hindi version video on youtube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQvmFNRUFVQ
English version below translated by Arkadev Chatterjea, July 2013
Brimming with wealth, grains, and flowers,
This earth of ours,
In which there is a land,
The finest of all.
Created in dreams,
Wrapped in memories.
Nowhere will you find a nation so grand,
Queen of all, my motherland.
Stars, planets, moon, and sun aglow
Where else with such a vibrant flow?
Where does lightning dance
In such deep, dark clouds?
Her birdsong lulls me to sleep,
And, birdcall wakes me up.
Nowhere will you find a nation so grand,
Queen of all, my motherland.
Who has such cool rivers?
Where are such misty mountains?
Where do such lush green fields
Rest under the sky?
Where does the wind make such waves
On ricefields and blow by?
Nowhere will you find a nation so grand,
Queen of all, my motherland.
The trees are decked with flowers
Singing birds teeming bowers.
Murmuring honeybees
Come in swarms
Drink the nectar
And sleep on the blossoms.
Nowhere will you find a nation so grand,
Queen of all, my motherland.
Such love from brother and mother,
Where else will you discover?
O Mother, I will clutch
Your two feet to my heart.
In this land I was born,
From here let me "Depart."
Nowhere will you find a nation so grand,
Queen of all, my motherland.
Few pictures enclosed
