Impression

Introduction

In the last chapter, we witnessed competing claims of the modern statecraft and tendencies that aspired to keep alive multiplicity of the form of this symbol, its meanings and memories of resistance against colonial state, i.e. a symbol of popular resistance against the state. The attempts to erase community ties (colours acquiring non-sectarian connotations) and its survival in the name of history (arrival of Ashokan wheel from Buddhist religious tradition) leads us to two different trajectories.

Firstly, this conflict takes us to voices of resistance and protest against the new flag that surfaced against the decision of the Flag committee outside the premise of the Constituent Assembly. Different political groups also raised their voice but were largely helpless or their concerns remained un-attended due to the composition of the Constituent Assembly. The removal of the Gandhian Charkha was lauded by Veer Damodar Savarkar (probably the most influential ideologue of Hindu nationalism at that time) who said that this move had made the new flag ‘much less objectionable’. Yet, he refused to recognize the new flag as the national flag of Hindusthan on the ground that the state of Indian Union and the Constituent Assembly were creations of the British will and not by the free choice of people through a national plebiscite. He advocated no flag ‘other than the Bhagwā with the Kundalini and the Kirpān inscribed on it’ for the country. Savarkar and the Maharashtra lobby of Hindu nationalists tried hard to pursue the case of the Bhagwā flag.