‘Abide With Me’ hymn

In news- The Union government decided to drop one of Mahatma Gandhi’s favorite hymns ‘Abide With Me’ from the Beating Retreat Ceremony 2022.

Key updates-

‘Abide With Me’ was excluded from the Beating Retreat ceremony as the government wanted to include “maximum number of Indian tunes”.
This year, only Indian origin or indigenous tunes were in the list in order to commemorate 75 years of India’s independence as “Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav”.
For this year’s ceremony, the hymn was replaced by the popular patriotic song “Ae Mere Watan Ke Logon”.
It was written by Kavi Pradeep to commemorate the supreme sacrifice made by Indian soldiers during the 1962 Indo-China war.
As per Army brochure, the 26 tunes played at this year’s ceremony include ‘Hey Kanchha’, ‘Channa Bilauri’, ‘Jai Janam Bhumi’, ‘Nritya Sarita’, ‘Vijay Josh’, ‘Kesaria Banna’, ‘Veer Siachen’, ‘Hathroi’, ‘Vijay Ghosh’, ‘Ladaakoo’, ‘Swadeshi’, ‘Amar Chattan’, ‘Golden Arrows’ and ‘Swarn Jayanti’.
‘Veer Sainik’, ‘Fanfare by Buglers, ‘INS India’, ‘Yashasvee’, ‘Jai Bharati’, ‘Kerala’, ‘Siki A Mole’, ‘Hind Ki Sena’, ‘Kadam Kadam Badhaye Ja’, ‘Drummers Call’ besides ‘Ae Mere Watan Ke Logon’ are also part of the tunes that will be played on the evening of January 29.

About ‘Abide With Me’ hymn-

It is a prayer (Christian hymn) for God to stay with the speaker throughout life and in death.
It was written by Scottish Anglican poet and hymnologist Henry Francis Lyte in 1847 as he was dying from tuberculosis.
It had been part of the Beating Retreat ceremony in India since 1950.
It is most often sung to the tune “Eventide” by William Henry Monk.

What is a Beating Retreat?

It is a centuries-old military tradition dating from the days when troops disengaged from the battle at sunset.
As soon as the buglers sounded the retreat, the troops ceased fighting, sheathed their arms and withdrew from the battlefield.
It also marks the end of nearly week-long festivities of Republic Day, which used to begin on January 24.
But this year, the celebrations began on January 23, the birth anniversary of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose.