Muhammad Iqbal
The famous Indian patriotic song “Sare Jahamse Acha” is composed by Muhammad Iqbal and published on weekly journal Ittehad on 16 August 1904. Saare Jahan Se Achcha has remained popular in India for nearly a century. Mahatma Gandhi is said to have sung it over a hundred times when he was imprisoned at Yerawada Jail in Pune in the 1930s.
In the 1930s and 1940s, it was sung to a slower tune. In 1945, sitarist Pandit Ravi Shankar set it to a stronger tune which is today the popular tune of this song.It was later recorded by the singer Lata Mangeshkar to an 3rd altogether different tune. Stanzas (1), (3), (4), and (6) of the song became an unofficial national song in India and the Ravi Shankar version was adopted as the official quick march of the Indian Armed Forces.
