The petition is likely to be mentioned in the Karnataka High Court for urgent hearing on Wednesday. (File Photo)An advocate moved the Karnataka High Court on Tuesday challenging the Congress government’s decision to sing only the first two stanzas of Vande Mataram at all of its programmes other than those attended by the President, vice-president, prime minister, or governor.In his public interest litigation (PIL), advocate Girish Bharadwaj argues that the September 8 government order issued in this regard is an exercise of executive power in a field where the state has no legislative power at all.The petition, likely to be mentioned for urgent hearing on Wednesday, contends that the state is not competent to pass such a restriction because the national song is not a subject enumerated in List II or List III of the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution.The Ministry of Home Affairs, by letter dated July 9, circulated an order to all states mandating that “on all occasions when the national song is sung, the official version only shall be recited in mass singing”, the petition states.The petition contends that, therefore, the Karnataka government’s decision that the “official version” of Vande Mataram shall not be sung at any state function is not merely a failure to assist the Union but an act of the state’s executive power in direct opposition to an act of the Union’s executive power.Congress resolution in 1937In August, the Congress decided to sing only the first two stanzas of Vande Mataram at its programmes. The Congress Working Committee (CWC), the party’s highest decision-making body, cited a 1937 CWC resolution to back its stand, arguing that the leading lights of the freedom movement, including Mahatma Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore, had backed limiting the public rendition of Vande Mataram to its first two stanzas.Also Read | Karnataka HC to hear plea challenging mandatory singing of all 6 stanzas of ‘Vande Mataram’ in schoolsThe NDA government at the Centre recently passed the Prevention of Insults to National Honour (Amendment) Act 2026, which makes attempts to stop or prevent the singing or playing of Vande Mataram a criminal offence.Story continues below this adThe PIL, which prays for quashing the state government order, also states that it is not seeking a direction to compel anyone to sing Vande Mataram. It wants that “wherever the national song is sung at a state function, it be sung in the version the Union government has prescribed”.