Introduction

The origin of a symbol is often shrouded in mystery. The mist gives rise to myths and entices historians. Writing on French tricolour, Raul Girardet echoes this pull quite succinctly—‘the history of any symbol must begin with an enigma: the mystery of its origins’. In strict techno-legal term, the tricolour in India was born on 22 July 1947 when the design of the tricolour was finalized and approved unanimously in the Constituent Assembly of India. In terms of aesthetic and ideological appeal this flag resembled quite closely with the flag of the Indian National Congress. However, the tricolour of India embodies a much deeper history, a trajectory that goes beyond its immediate precursor—the party flag of the Indian National Congress. The trail even leads us beyond the anti-colonial movement that witnessed galvanization of popular sentiments around a flag, often equating party flags as the national flags. However, on such a path, quest for the origins may be misleading or at best a truncated journey. The political symbolism of the flag, as we will see, is connected to totemic practices as well as archaeological traces with speculative meanings. This chapter aims to traverse the vastness of this canvas. This exploration also points to the ambiguous pasts of the Indian national flag and betrays the finitude inbuilt in the search for the origins. It is in this spirit, this chapter asks a simple question, how to trace the genealogy of the tricolour flag in pre-colonial times? With a documentation that goes beneath a mere listing of flags of native rulers and mythological characters, this chapter argues that the plural past shaped the heterogeneous ways of seeing the flag in colonial and post-Independent period.

This history informs us that the flags of twentieth century should not merely be seen as political symbols representing parties, ideologies and the nation. Historical trajectories lead us to suggest that outside state strictures, the flag was never treated merely as a political symbol. In other words, this chapter argues that the politics of the national flag essentially be studied by excavating religious, social and historical roles of the flag in the wider circuit of symbols. It effectively means that other dimensions cannot be disentangled from the political identity of this symbol.