{"id":189805,"date":"2025-12-09T10:20:42","date_gmt":"2025-12-09T05:20:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/?p=189805"},"modified":"2025-12-09T10:32:17","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T05:32:17","slug":"forcing-vande-mataram-on-citizens-violates-religious-freedoms-ruhullah","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/2025\/12\/09\/forcing-vande-mataram-on-citizens-violates-religious-freedoms-ruhullah.html","title":{"rendered":"Forcing Vande Mataram on citizens violates religious freedoms: Ruhullah"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Srinagar: National Conference Member of Parliament Agha Ruhullah Mehdi has said that compelling citizens to sing Vande Mataram is a violation of religious freedoms and an assault on India\u2019s pluralistic character.<\/p>\n

According to Kashmir Media Service, participating in a debate on the Indian song in the Lok Sabha, the Srinagar MP said no community disrespects Vande Mataram, but the issue arises \u201cwhen people are told they must sing it to prove their loyalty or secure their place in India.\u201d He stressed that religious freedom is an \u201ceternal identity\u201d which cannot be overridden by enforced conformity.<\/p>\n

Ruhullah said that \u201cdemanding that we sing it is not acceptable.\u201d Drawing a line between civic and religious identities, he noted that nationality may change, but a person\u2019s faith remains constant, and constitutional guarantees protect this individuality.<\/p>\n

The NC leader warned that debates of this nature were being weaponised to deflect attention from unemployment, inflation and governance failures, alleging that Muslims were being targeted \u201cto hide incompetence.\u201d He said communities across India share the same basic aspirations \u2014 clean water, clean air and jobs \u2014 and have equally contributed to the country\u2019s freedom struggle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Srinagar: National Conference Member of Parliament Agha Ruhullah Mehdi has said that compelling citizens to sing Vande Mataram is a violation of religious freedoms and an assault on India\u2019s pluralistic character. According to Kashmir Media Service, participating in a debate on the Indian song in the Lok Sabha, the Srinagar MP said no community disrespects …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":189806,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[5],"class_list":["post-189805","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-top-story"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/assests\/2025\/12\/Capture-4.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189805","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189805"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189805\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":189807,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189805\/revisions\/189807"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/189806"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189805"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189805"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189805"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}