Happy Republic Day 2023: How the national flag tricolor came into existence, take a look at this saga
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Happy Republic Day 2023: For decades, the All India Congress, under the leadership of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, fought to unite the millions of British-ruled people in the Indian subcontinent. Like similar movements in other countries, it soon realized the need for a distinctive symbol that could represent its nationalist aims. So in 1921, a university lecturer named Pingali (or Pingale) Venkayya presented a flag design to Gandhi that incorporated the colors associated with the two major religions, red for Hindus and green for Muslims. In the center of the horizontally divided flag, Lala Hans Raj Sondhi suggested adding the traditional spinning wheel, which was associated with Gandhi’s crusade to make Indians self-reliant by making their own clothes from local fibers.
thousands of people raised the flag
Gandhi modified the flag by adding a white stripe in the center for other religious communities in India. Thus also providing a clearly visible background for the spinning wheel. Thousands of people raised the flag during a peaceful protest against British rule in Nagpur in May 1923, hundreds of whom were arrested. The Congress flag came to be associated with nationalism for India and was officially recognized at the party’s annual meeting in August 1931. Also, the current arrangement of stripes and the use of dark saffron instead of red were approved.
How the colors of the tricolor got connected
To avoid the communal associations of the original proposal, new attributes were attached to the saffron, white and green stripes. They were said to be symbols of courage and sacrifice, peace and truth and faith and valor respectively. During World War II, Subhash Chandra Bose used this flag (without the spinning wheel) in the areas occupied by his Japanese aided forces.
The tricolor was hoisted on 22 July 1947
After the war, Britain agreed to consider India’s independence, although the country was partitioned and Muslim-majority Pakistan was given the status of a separate state. The Indian national flag was officially hoisted on 22 July 1947. Its stripes remained saffron-white-green, but the spinning wheel was replaced by a blue wheel – the Dharma Chakra (“Wheel of the Law”). The Dharma Chakra, which is associated with Emperor Ashoka in the 3rd century BCE, appeared on pillars during the first serious attempt to unify the whole of India under a single government in the Maurya Empire. The 1947 flag continues to be used by India, although special versions have been developed for ships registered in the country.
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