Pingali Venkayya | |
|---|---|
 Venkayya on a 2009 stamp of India | |
| Born | 2 August 1876/8 |
| Died | 4 July 1963 (aged 84 or 86) India |
| Other names | Diamond Venkayya Patti Venkayya |
| Known for | Design ofIndian National Flag |
| Spouse | Rukminamma |
Pingali Venkayya (2 August 1876/8[1][2] – 4 July 1963) was an Indian freedom fighter, known for designing the initial version of theIndian National Flag.[3] Apart from his role in the independence movement, Venkayya was alecturer, author,geologist,educationalist,agriculturist, and apolyglot.[4][5]
Venkayya joined theBritish Indian Army at age 19 and served inSouth Africa during theSecond Boer War (1899–1902). During his service, he recognized the need for a national flag for India as Indian soldiers were required to salute theUnion Jack, the British flag.[6] Inspired by his experience and later by attending the 1906AICC session inCalcutta, he developed a vision for a flag representing Indians, opposing the practice of hoisting the British flag at Congress meetings.[2]
Venkayya presented his design for an Indian national flag toMahatma Gandhi in 1921 during Gandhi's visit toVijayawada.[7][8][9] The flag initially consisted of red and green stripes representing Hindus and Muslims, respectively, and, on Gandhi's suggestion, a white stripe was added to represent other communities in India.[6] This flag design was used informally at Congress meetings from 1921 and served as the foundation for the Indian national flag, which was officially adopted in its final form by theConstituent Assembly on 22 July 1947.[2][6][7]
Venkayya was an agriculturist, as well as an educationist who set up an educational institution inMachilipatnam. Despite his contributions, he died in poverty in 1963 and remained largely unrecognized in his later years.[4][6] In 2009, the Indian government issued a postage stamp in his honour, and in 2012, his name was recommended for a posthumousBharat Ratna, though no formal response was received from the central government.[2][6]
Pingali Venkayya was born on 2 August 1876 or 1878 atBhatlapenumarru, nearMachilipatnam, in what is now the Indian state ofAndhra Pradesh.[2][5][10] His parents were Hanumantha Rayudu and Venkata Ratnam. He studied at the Hindu High School in Machilipatnam, but also spent his childhood in various places in the Krishna district likeYarlagadda andPedakallepalli. He married Rukminamma, the daughter of theKaranam ofPamarru village.[11]
At the age of 19, he enrolled in theBritish Indian Army and was deployed to South Africa during theSecond Boer War (1899–1902), where he met Gandhi for the first time.[2] It was during the war when the soldiers had to salute theUnion Jack, the national flag of Britain, that Venkayya realised the need for having a flag for Indians.[6][11]
Venkayya earned a diploma inGeology from theMadras Presidency College. From 1911–1944, he worked as alecturer at the Andhra National College in Machilipatnam. From 1924 to 1944, he researchedmica inNellore. He also authored a book titled 'Thalli Raayi' on geology.[12]
Venkayya was also popularly nicknamed 'Diamond Venkayya', as he was an expert in diamond mining. He was also called 'Patti Venkayya' (Cotton Venkayya), because he dedicated most of his time to researching staple varieties of cotton and did a detailed study on a variety called Cambodia Cotton.[5][13] He was apolyglot who was proficient in many languages includingJapanese andUrdu.[5][6] He delivered a full-length speech in Japanese at a school inBapatla in 1913. From then, he also came to be referred to as 'Japan Venkayya'.[13][14]
When Venkayya attended theAll India Congress Committee (AICC) session in 1906 inCalcutta under the leadership ofDadabhai Naoroji, he was inspired to design a flag for theIndian National Congress as he opposed the idea of hoisting theBritish flag at Congress meetings.[2] Venkayya worked on potential designs that could be used as flags for the newly coined Swaraj movement to signify independence. There were over 25 drafts of the flags with different significance and relations with Indian culture, heritage and history. In 1916, he published a book titledBharatha Desaniki Oka Jatiya Patakam (transl. A National Flag for India) with 30 potential designs for a flag.[12][14] From 1918 to 1921, he proposed various ideas to the Congress leadership while also working at the Andhra National College in Machilipatnam.[1][2][6]
In 1921, the AICC held its two-day crucial session in Bezawada (nowVijayawada) on March 31 and April 1.[16][17] When Gandhi asked Venkayya to submit a design for the flag at the session, he did it within three hours. Venkayya had shown Gandhi a rudimentary design of a flag on aKhadi bunting. This first flag was coloured red and green — the red representing Hindus and the green representing Muslims in the country. On Gandhi's suggestion, Venkayya added a white stripe to represent all the other denominations and religions present in the country. While the flag was not officially adopted by the AICC, which reordered the stripes and changed the red to orange in 1931, it came to be used across the country. Since 1921, Venkayya's flag has been used informally at all Congress meetings. The flag was adopted in its present form during a meeting of theConstituent Assembly on 22 July 1947, twenty days before India's Independence.[2][6][7][11][18]
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Venkayya lived humbly according toGandhian ideologies and died in 1963. Venkayya's daughter Ghantasala Seetha Mahalakshmi passed away on 21 July 2022 at the age of 100.[19][20]
A postage stamp to commemorate Venkayya and the first flag was issued in 2009.[2] The Vijayawada station ofAll India Radio was named after him in 2014.[13][14] In 2012, his name was proposed for a posthumousBharat Ratna though there has been no response from the central government on the proposal.[4][6]
In 1995, then Chief Minister of Andhra PradeshN. T. Rama Rao commissioned a statue of Venkayya – one among the 31 state icons – atTank Bund Road inHyderabad.[19] In January 2015, a statue of him was unveiled by the thenUrban Development MinisterVenkaiah Naidu, in the forelawns of the All India Radio building in Vijayawada.[5] Several statues of Venkayya have been built all over Andhra Pradesh.