Indian Flag

Make PDF

In News: India is celebrating the Constitution Day, On 26th November 2020.

The Indian flag

The National Flag of India, in its present form, was adopted by the Constituent Assembly on July 22, 1947.
It served as the National Flag of the Dominion of India between August 15, 1947, and January 26, 1950, and that of the Republic of India thereafter.
The Indian flag is a horizontal tricolor with saffron (kesari) at the top, white in the middle and green at the bottom in equal proportion.
Saffron indicates strength and courage, white indicates peace and truth and green is the colour of fertility, growth and auspiciousness of the land.
The ratio of width of the flag to its length is two to three.

The Chakra

At the centre of the white band is a 24-spoke navy-blue chakra called Dharma Chakra.
Taken from the Lion Capital of the Ashokan pillar, the “wheel of the law” ‘symbolises the progressiveness of the country.
Its diameter approximates to the width of the white band.

Flag Code

On January 26, 2002, the Indian Flag Code was modified after almost 55 years of Independence, allowing the people of India to hoist the National Flag at their homes, offices and factories every day and not just on National days as was the case earlier.
Now Indians can proudly display the National Flag anywhere and anytime, as long as the provisions of the Flag Code are strictly followed to avoid any inadvertent disrespect to the Tricolour.
For the sake of convenience, the Flag Code of India, 2002, has been divided into three parts:
- Part I of the Code contains general description of the National Flag;
- Part II of the Code is devoted to the display of the National Flag by members of public, private organisations, educational institutions, etc; and
- Part III of the Code relates to display of the National Flag by Central and State governments and their organisations and agencies.

Evolution of Tricolour

The Indian Flag has undergone many changes since its first inception during the struggle for freedom. Some
of the historical milestones in the evolution of Indian Flag are:
The first national flag in India is said to have been hoisted on August 7, 1906, in the Parsee Bagan Square
(Green Park) in Calcutta (now Kolkata). The flag comprised three horizontal strips of red, yellow and green.
The second flag was hoisted in 1907 in Paris by Madame Cama and her band of exiled revolutionaries.
This was similar to the first flag. This flag was also exhibited at a socialist conference in Berlin.
The third flag went up in 1917 when the political struggle had taken a definite turn. Annie Besant and Lokmanya Tilak hoisted it during the Home Rule movement. This flag had five red and four green horizontal
stripes arranged alternately, with seven stars in the saptarishi configuration superimposed on them. In the
The left-hand top corner (the pole end) was the Union Jack. There was also a white crescent and star in one
corner.
During the 1921 session of the All India Congress Committee at Bezwada (now Vijayawada) an Andhra
youth Pingali Venkayya prepared a flag and took it to Gandhiji. It was made up of two colours, red and
green, representing the two major communities i.e. Hindus and Muslims. The flag was adopted in 1931. This
The flag was also the battle ensign of the Indian National Army.
The year 1931 was a landmark in the history of the flag. A resolution was passed adopting a tricolor flag as
our national flag. This flag, the forerunner of the present one, was saffron, white and green with Mahatma Gandhi’s charkha (spinning wheel) at the centre. It was, however, clarified that it bore no communal significance and was not to be interpreted thus.
On July 22, 1947, the Constituent Assembly adopted it as the Free India National Flag. After Independence,the colours and their significance remained the same. Only the Dharma Chakra of Emperor Ashoka replaced the spinning wheel at the centre.