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India: Historical Flags

Bharat

Last modified: 2005-07-09 by rob raeside
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History of the flag

The September 1997 edition of the magazine 'History Today' was a special number to mark the 50th anniversary of Indian independence and an illustration of vexillological interest appeared on the front cover. It showed an oleograph entitled 'Mother India Freed' which dates from 1947. An allegorical figure of India is seen holding seven different flags which partly obscure each other and which are identified only by dates. I presume that they are flags used by Indian nationalists (and probably by the Indian National Congress) at different stages of the freedom struggle. In chronological order they are as follows:
See also:

I have compared Vincent's notes and GIFs to two books on Indian flags: K V Singh: Our national flag (New Delhi, 1991) and P T Nair: Indian national symbols (Calcutta, 1987). 'History Today' has taken some liberties, it seems, especially in terms of colours (using blue instead of green).
Jan Oskar Engene, 23 August 1997

The fault is unlikely to lie with 'History Today': the green of the 1931 Congress flag and of the 1947 national flag are both reproduced correctly in the illustration so I think the error in the colouring must have been made by the original artist who was working in 1947 - strong evidence that the details of the earlier flags were not well known in India at that time.
Vincent Morley, 23 August 1997

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