---
title: Bharat Mata (Mother India)
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/bharat-mata-tagore-1905/
description: Abanindranath Tagore's 1905 painting personifies India as a four-armed, haloed woman in saffron robes, holding a manuscript, a garland, a bowl of grain…
section: Collection
---

[Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/)

[![Bharat Mata (Mother India)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/bharat-mata-tagore-1905.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/bharat-mata-tagore-1905.jpg)

# Bharat Mata (Mother India)

Abanindranath Tagore's 1905 painting personifies India as a four-armed, haloed woman in saffron robes, holding a manuscript, a garland, a bowl of grain and a strip of white cloth to offer knowledge, spiritual initiation, food and homespun cloth to her devotees. Painted during the Swadeshi movement's boycott of British goods, the image casts the nation itself as a deity to be revered, folding a political program into an act of religious devotion.

- **Date:** 1905
- **Period:** [Pre-1914](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#era=pre-1914)
- **Made by:** Swadeshi movement (Bengal School of Art); artist Abanindranath Tagore
- **Region:** [South Asia](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#region=south-asia)
- **Country:** [British India](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#country=british-india)
- **Medium:** [Artwork](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#medium=artwork)
- **Issuer type:** [Movement](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#actor=movement)
- **Regime:** [British Raj](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#regime=british-raj)
- **Leader:** [George Nathaniel Curzon](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#leader=george-nathaniel-curzon)
- **Audience:** [Domestic public](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#audience=domestic-public)
- **Purpose:** [Persuade or win support](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#purpose=persuade-support)
- **Themes:** [Empire and colonialism](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=empire-colonialism), [Religion](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=religion), [Economy and finance](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=economy-finance)
- **Event:** [Swadeshi Movement](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#event=swadeshi-movement)
- **Techniques:** [Transfer](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/transfer/) [Glittering generalities](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/glittering-generalities/)
- **Source:** Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- **Source:** [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bharat_Mata_by_Abanindranath_Tagore.jpg), retrieved September 28, 2026
- **Rights:** Public domain (per Wikimedia Commons) http://www.kamat.com/picturehouse/bharat/100j.htm

## Text on the object

Original (Bengali) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
[illegible]
```

English translation (machine translation by Claude, not verified by a fluent reader)

```
[illegible — nothing legible to translate]
```

A small bordered seal/monogram (not a caption or title) sits in the painting's lower-left corner, with characters inside a rectangular frame, too faint/low-contrast to read at this scan's resolution. Language given as Bengali on balance of probability (Tagore's idiom, the seal's script shape), not confirmed. Could be the artist's own seal or a later collection stamp; cannot tell which. No other inscription is visible on the painting.

[← "Julen 1904": the first Christmas seal (Denmark, 1904)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/denmark-first-christmas-seal-1904/) [Fidèles compagnons du buveur : Misère & Mort (The Drinker's Faithful Companions: Misery and Death) →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/misere-et-mort-anti-alcohol-1905/)

## Using the same techniques

- [Bronze sestertius of Gaius (Caligula), reverse S P Q R P P OB CIVES SERVATOS in an oak wreath](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sestertius-caligula-ob-cives-servatos-0037/) (0037 · Testimonial, Transfer)
- [Gold coin of Kanishka: King of Kings legend, king at the altar, deity Oesho](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gold-dinar-kanishka-king-of-kings-0130/) (0130 · Transfer)
- [Gold solidus of Justinian I, reverse VICTORIA AVGGG with Victory holding a Christogram staff](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/solidus-justinian-i-victoria-avggg-0538/) (0538 · Transfer, Glittering generalities)
- [Bayeux Tapestry, scene 23: UBI HAROLD SACRAMENTVM FECIT VVILLELMO DVCI](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/bayeux-tapestry-harold-oath-to-william-1070/) (1070 · Transfer, Card stacking)
- [Frontispiece to Eikon Basilike, The Pourtraicture of His Sacred Majestie in his Solitudes and Sufferings (Hollar, 1649)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/eikon-basilike-frontispiece-hollar-1649/) (1649 · Transfer, Glittering generalities)
- [Consult of the doctors on the grave illness of the Grand Sultan (Consult vande medicijnen inde swaere siekte vanden grooten Sultaen)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/consult-of-the-doctors-sick-sultan-antwerp-1683/) (1683 · Transfer, Bandwagon)
- [The Highlanders Medley, or The Duke Triumphant (A Loyal Song)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/highlanders-medley-duke-triumphant-1746/) (1746 · Name-calling, Transfer)
- [Marche du Dom Quichotte moderne pour la deffence du Moulin des Abus (March of the Modern Don Quixote in Defence of the Mill of Abuses)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/dom-quichotte-moulin-des-abus-1791/) (1791 · Name-calling, Transfer)