The Gift of India: Form and Language

The Gift of India: Form and Language

Form and language of the poem

The poem The Gift of India has a simple and elegant rhyme scheme of aabbcc. Each of the stanzas have six lines, where

the first two lines introduce either an idea or create a picture, the next two lines build up on them, and the final two present a sort of small conclusion for the stanza. (In many anthologies and websites the poem is treated as a whole undivided piece. 

The poem as an entire piece has a subtle flow in it where Mother India herself proclaims proudly her gifts to the west.

The first stanza introduces the various gifts India has bestowed upon the colonisers, which include both its riches

and people. The second stanza focuses more on the wistful state of martyred Indian soldiers. The third stanza talks of

the grief those deaths have brought. And finally, the fourth stanza is a sort of appeal to honour the sacrifices of the Indian soldiers for the cause of the war.The poem ‘The gift of India’ started as a celebration of India’s contribution to the causes of others. But it ends up as a strong war poem, concentrating both on the evils of

destruction wars bring, and the mourning, as well as the courage, honour and recognition of the heroes who fight in

it. As always, Naidu’s poem arouses a sense of pride and patriotism in the hearts of her countrymen.