Date:20/07/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/07/20/stories/2008072051780300.htm

Andhra Pradesh

Sardar Patel’s statue to be unveiled on July 22

Staff Reporter

Statue of Sardar Vallabhbai Patel

BAPATLA: The statue of freedom fighter and first deputy prime minister of India Sardar Vallabhai has been installed in the Patel Nagar here and will be unveiled on Tuesday next.

The National Cooperative Building Society of Patel Nagar, formed a year after Sardar Patel’s death in Mumbai in December 1950, decided to honour him by unveiling his statue on the society office premises. Tuesday being National Flag Day also, we decided to get the statue unveiled by the Tenali Revenue Divisional Officer I. Venkateswara Rao, the president of the society P.C. Sai Babu said in a release.

Detailing the history of the Flag, he said “the Constituent Assembly which drew up the Constitution of India, adopted the Tricolour as Independent India’s National Flag on July 22, 1947. After a debate, the Dharma Chakra (of Emperor Ashoka) was included in the central white stripe of the flag, instead of the Charka (used symbolically by Gandhiji and also included in the flag used by the Indian National Congress)”.

The flag was first flown and recognised as the Indian National Flag (not just as that of the Congress Party) in Hamburg in 1942. On August 15, 1947 the dominions of India and Pakistan were established. India adopted the familiar horizontal tricolour of orange, white, and green with a blue Ashoka Chakra at the centre. These colours had been used, since the early 1920s as the flag of the Indian National Congress.