The Jana Gana Mana - Indian National Anthem was a historic video
released
January 26, 2000 to mark the 50th year of the Indian Republic. It has
the
distinction of being released by the then President of India, in the
Central Hall of the Indian Parliament. It was produced by Bharat Bala
and
Kanika Myer and published by Ministry of Culture, Youth Affairs and
Sports,
Government of India.

Bharat Bala and A. R. Rahman came together to create a historic album
called ‘Jana Gana Mana’. This was a project in which over 35 top
artistes
of the nation came together to sing or play the Indian National Anthem,
“Jana Gana Mana”. The project had started as “Desh Ka Salaam”
which was
telecast in Indian TV channels and on the web on August 15, 1999, in
which
several great Indian musicians, from the classical to the contemporary,
came together to give a soulful and modern rendition of the National
Anthem. The video was released on January 26, 2000.

The Making of the Video
Bharat Bala and Kanika had been working together on various projects
such
as Vande Mataram (1996, 1998) and Desh Ka Salaam (1999) when they
realised
that there was not a single popular rendering of the Indian National
Anthem. They thus decided to re-create the National Anthem in a year
2000
version, something that should be ‘inspiring for young people to
listen
to.’

Bharat Bala Productions roped in A R Rahman to produce the music and 60
artistes were taken to Ladakh in North India to film the video for the
instrumental version of the video. The final instrumental was a
40-piece
string section along with Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma, Vikku Vinayakram
and
other instrumental maestros of Indian classical music. Most of the
performances included two generations of maestros - fathers and sons.
In
Kanika’s words, “It was a huge musical unification… this anthem
has so much
of soul.”

It is also notable that during the filming of the anthem with the
Ladakh
Scouts, there were about 500 jawans who fought during the Kargil war.
The
producers hoisted a huge flag about 40 feet long for the video in their
honour.

Thota Tharini, an artist based out of Madras painted what is now the
Vande
Mataram logo for the video.

Music
The music was produced and arranged by A R Rahman. The video was
produced
by Bharat Bala Productions.

Vocalists
* D. K. Pattammal
* Pandit Bhimsen Joshi
* Lata Mangeshkar
* Pandit Jasraj
* Mangalampalli Balamurali Krishna
* Jagjit Singh
* Pandit Ajoy Chakrabarty
* Shobha Gurtu
* Begum Parveena Sultana
* Bhupen Hazarika
* Ustad Rashid Khan
* Ustad Ghulam Mustafa Khan
* Smt. Shruti Sadolikar
* Dr S P Balasubramaniam
* Sudha Raghunathan
* Asha Bhosle
* Hariharan
* Kavita Krishnamurthy
* P Unnikrishnan
* Nityashree
* Saddiq Khan Langa
* Ghulam Murtaza Khan
* Ghulam Qadir Khan
* Kaushiki Chakrabarty

Instrumentalists
* Flute: Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia
* Sarod: Ustad Amjad Ali Khan, Amaan Ali Bangash, Ayaan Ali Bangash
* Santoor: Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma, Rahul Sharma
* Ghattam: Vikku Vinayakram, Uma Shankar
* Mohan Veena: Pandit Vishwa Mohan Bhatt
* Saxophone: Kadri Gopalnath
* Chitraveena: Ravikiran
* Veena: E Gayathri
* Sarangi: Ustad Sultan Khan
* Sitar: Pandit Kartick Kumar, Niladri Kumar
* Violin: Kumaresh, Ganesh

Orchestra
* Conductor: K. Srinivas Murthy
* Cello: Ramsekar, R K Vijayandran, Bidyur Khayal
* Tympany: Kumar, Karthikeyan
* Violin: M Kalyanasundaram, Jerry Fernandes, Cyril Fernandes, R
Joseph, K Murali, B J Chandru, B Balu, Murali, Dinakar,
Rex Isaac, Debu Ashish, PJ Sebastian, P S Ramachandran
* Mridangam: D A Srinivas
* Harp: R Visweswaran

The Video
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7399792002477900458