Everyone remembers his or her school days with fondness. At school one learns a lot of things and one of them happens to be the national anthem. I remember my first acquaintance with the national anthem at school. As on the first day of my school I had not known how to sing it and had lip singed it. But as the days passed on I too was able to sing it with the rest of the students. Some years ago, talking about our childhood, with my friends, I found out that most of them had also learned the national anthem the same way. Thousands of students learn the national anthem at school. In school they are taught how to sing it properly. (With respect).
School is probably the best place to learn these things as well, as national anthem belongs to the entire nation it is better taught in a group. It sounds better when a group of Nepalese sing their national song.
But recently I found out that national anthem is no longer a part of the school assembly. And moreover a young cousin of mine, who has been going to school for a few years now does not know anything about the national anthem. (That left me wondering as to how his assembly looks like). The reason behind this was due to the threat issued by the Maoists the schools have halted the trend of singing national anthem during school assembly. The Maoists have banned the national anthem, as they believe it sounds less like a national anthem and more like a personal prayer to the King. Rumour has it that they have created their own national anthem to replace it, but even their song has not been effective, as we don’t know about it.
Well it’s not just the rebels with negative view about our national anthem. People from different sectors have been voicing their dissatisfaction with certain words in the anthem. And they feel that the ban of national anthem imposed in schools is good. But this brings no solution to the problem. If so many people are not happy singing the existing national anthem then maybe it’s about time to create a new one. That would not be full of praise to one person but would be grand enough to satisfy all the citizens. So that all Nepalese can sing their national anthem with pride. As I was taught in my school (standing erect and with head held high on top of ones voice).
– Pratichya Dulal
