Vande Mataram was composed by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and first published in his 1882 Bengali novel *Anandamath*, set against the backdrop of the Sannyasi Rebellion. It became a rallying cry during the Partition of Bengal in 1905 and was sung at the 1896 Indian National Congress session — making 2025 the 129th year since that moment, not the 150th. The 150-year count traces back to the composition itself, dated to approximately 1875, though Chatterjee's own chronology of the manuscript remains debated among scholars.
Vande Mataram was composed by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and first published in his 1882 Bengali novel *Anandamath*, set against the backdrop of the Sannyasi Rebellion. It became a rallying cry during the Partition of Bengal in 1905 and was sung at the 1896 Indian National Congress session — making 2025 the 129th year since that moment, not the 150th. The 150-year count traces back to the composition itself, dated to approximately 1875, though Chatterjee's own chronology of the manuscript remains debated among scholars.