Our National-Flag is the most powerful brand that we as a nation have - which clearly stands head and shoulders above all other brands.

There is nothing wrong at all with the flag and national colours making their way onto grills, gates, back of trucks, school bags and even some corporate logos, as long as the spirit, serenity and the sanctity is protected.

Symbols, shapes and colours, including the flag, do have an important place in people's psyche. The semiotic world governs the behaviour of human beings in a significant way and does evoke strong emotive responses from individuals. One cannot generalise their impact since it depends upon how they are used by the people who evolve the symbols

Out of the five colours our corporate identity - Rainbow flower with "Wipro Applying Thought" as the bye-line has - three are similar to those in our national flag. This identity was launched in April 1998 and when we unfolded the same among about 14,000 Wiproites and Wipro's associates, the first visual was on explaining how our national flag binds our nation of diversity. Every time we showed the visual of the national flag, it evoked an emotional response from the entire audience and Wiproites even stood up.

The Indian flag for me stands for freedom. It stands for sentiments of patriotism and courage that are instilled in all of India's citizens. It is a symbol of integrity and pride for us as a nation that is ready to become a global super power.

National culture in the Nehruvian sense of the term was honourable and it reflected the post-independence ethics of the national state. If I have retracted in recent times from national symbols it is due to their overuse and indeed their overt abuse by the rightwing, particularly the Sangh Parivar. While I have no basic problem with the display or even celebration of the National-Flag, its appropriation by the rightwing over the past decade or so is quite unacceptable. With a change of political climate, the national can be reclaimed as a ground for thinking through urgent social issues. It is very possible that one will return to an easy relationship with the flag, as with other national symbols, if the balance of priorities in the country is restored.

We live in an age when the matter of appropriating symbols while remaining indifferent to "a cultural sense of the sacred." has been quite extraordinary. The flag and the map are symbols that appear to be up for grabs. I am therefore in conflict. While I want everyone to have the right to the flag but to have it produced ad nauseam and commercialised is not something that I would go with. It is like a plastic shopping bag that came into my household the other day that had the Indian flag printed on both sides. It amused me at first and then made me very angry.

I revere my National-Flag as much as my motherland. It inspires patriotism, more so in people who have lived in the pre-independence era, as they have experienced the hardship of being ruled by foreigners. I hope the present generation and the generations to come will also hold our National-Flag in high esteem, as it is sacred to every Indian.

The flag under which we are standing is not just a piece of cloth. This is a symbol of the sacrifices made in our struggle for freedom, later on the sacrifices by our brave soldiers on our borders in various wars and now of those who with their hard labour are engaged in the struggle for India's progress and also of our promising youth. Our flag and our National Anthem are no ordinary things. They unite the country and bind it together and that is why I want to say that the glory of the flag must be protected at the cost of life.

The sky was grey and cloudy. It was a misty morning in August 1947. I had walked four miles from my lodgings on the bank of the Ganga with my friend and at last there we were, staring at the new evidence of a new age in the history of our country - the high sunshine of independence. Never perhaps had such an excitement gripped my senses; the mere sight of a flag swaying gently in the vast maidan at Bankipur in Patna, made me go into unimaginable ecstasies.
Hard to say, but maybe one's ideals hit you hardest when you are young. I was then a fifth year student doing my Masters in Physics in Science College, Patna. I was sixteen, living in dreams, winning sometimes, losing often.
Today, years of writing poetry cannot bring me the same fling of joy the sight of the tricolour flying on the dawn of 15th August 1947 had given me.
The flag had nothing special. It was wordless, dumb. But it spoke a million words, words of freedom. I realized I had moved away from one house into my own. I looked around me once again. And everywhere the grass was greener than ever before.

Children are less suspicious and ignorant of the corruption that erodes our system like cancer. Their lack of experience with functional India, keeps them blissfully ignorant and preserves their naive patriotism.

Every year I hoist my National-Flag in my terrace and sing my National Anthem. This habit was to let my children enjoy the same naive patriotism that I enjoyed as a child. It has become a habit.

The flag solicits a certain emotion like the insurance company symbol or the medical symbol or the Red Cross. No symbol is worth the cloth it is printed on if it empowers dictators or facilitates division. I, by mindset, would like to stretch borders. I think patriotism as per lore is quite ridiculous and impractical. I am a dreamer who dreams of a war free silk route. When that happens we can proudly and legitimately call America as nephew Sam. We will then be the big uncles by any global standards.

When I was a young poet living in New Delhi, I used to publish poems in Shri V K Krishnan Menon's venture "Century." One of the poems was on the National Flag. Mr. Menon said to me on the phone, " you can be arrested for this cynical verse." But he allowed it to be published. The young writers were skeptical of the newfound freedom India enjoyed seeing the poverty and squalor around them. The poem still figures in anthologies of my poems brought out by different publishers.
The present situation too makes us uneasy. The financial indebtedness to the IMF, which cannot be cast off for generations to come. The restrictions on export, the lifting of restrictions on imports and the vagueness regarding our stand on Iraq frightens us. We have to redefine the word patriotism. I do not burst with pride looking at the National- Flag.

The greater presence and popularity of our national flag today in comparison to my playing days has to be credited to today's youngsters and the media. While we all deserve the flag, those among us who have done a greater service for the country, deserve the flag even more. Placing the flag over their coffin is therefore a fitting tribute.

The National-Flag is an emblem of our fight for freedom and an assertion of our sovereignty. It is our common property not a status symbol for V.I.P.s. We have every right to fly it where and when we like.

The flag reminds you of the state. The increasing presence of flag, as desired by some, will make the state omnipresent in our lives. I don't think that is a welcome idea. It is the individual who has to be omnipresent.

The increasing presence of flag in everyday life would lead to people not giving respect to the flag even on occasions that demand the presence of the flag. Being accustomed to seeing the flag everyday and everywhere, they are unlikely to even get up during a flag hoisting ceremony.

The use of a flag is governed by codes including for things like how a flag is to be rolled off a war hero or an important citizen's casket before the burial or cremation takes place. To have flags everywhere such as on buses or trucks where obviously no such codes are followed is only devaluing the flag.

The flag was made sacrosanct to begin with and now wanting to change it into an everyday reality that can be seen twenty-four hours a day on buses, cycle rickshaws etc. will only make you bored with it. While I am not a flag waving type of person on Independence Day or Republic Day, this type of approach take away the enthusiasm of those who are.

If you say the multiple interpretations of the flag and having it put up everywhere is in order, then the next question is "why not use the National Anthem to create dance tunes?"