Carved sandstone spires and figure sculpture on a temple at Khajuraho.
A carved stone chariot wheel on the plinth of the Sun Temple at Konark.
The Taj Mahal in white marble, reflected in its watercourse at dawn.
Temple ruins among granite boulders in the landscape at Hampi.
Rock-cut monuments on the shore at Mahabalipuram.
Carved sandstone spires and figure sculpture on a temple at Khajuraho.
A carved stone chariot wheel on the plinth of the Sun Temple at Konark.
The Taj Mahal in white marble, reflected in its watercourse at dawn.
Temple ruins among granite boulders in the landscape at Hampi.
Rock-cut monuments on the shore at Mahabalipuram.

Independence

Period
1947
Era
08 / 8
Independence — surviving material
Abrsinha · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Commons

The wheel from Sarnath's lion capital is placed at the centre of the flag, tying the new republic to a third-century BCE pillar.

About

A new state choosing its symbols, and choosing them from the third century BCE. The wheel taken from the abacus of Ashoka's lion capital at Sarnath was placed at the centre of the national flag, and the capital itself became the State Emblem.

Context

The Constituent Assembly adopted the national flag on 22 July 1947, with the Ashoka Chakra and its twenty-four spokes replacing the spinning wheel of the earlier design. Independence followed on 15 August. The State Emblem, adapted from the Sarnath lion capital, was adopted on 26 January 1950, when the Constitution came into force and India became a republic.

What survives

The lion capital itself, excavated at Sarnath and now in the site museum there. The pillar it stood on was raised by Ashoka at the place where the Buddha is held to have given his first sermon — the turning of the wheel of dhamma, which is what the chakra depicts. Sarnath was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2026, becoming India's forty-fifth property.

Significance

A republic three years old reached back twenty-two centuries for its emblem. That choice is the whole argument of this site in miniature: heritage is not what survives by accident, but what a society decides to carry forward and put at the centre of things.

Material from this period

3 images