Indian National Symbols Quiz — 7 Free Questions

Question 1

In what year did the Indian government officially declare the Ganga, or Ganges, as the country's National River?

Question 2

What is the name of India's national song, distinct from its national anthem? It was an important rallying cry during the independence movement.

Question 3

The Taj Mahal, one of the most recognized symbols of India around the world, was built by which Mughal emperor?

Question 4

India Gate, the war memorial in New Delhi, stands about how tall?

Question 5

In which Indian city is the Taj Mahal located? It was built as a tomb for a Mughal emperor's wife.

Question 6

What is the name of India's national emblem, showing four lions standing back to back? It was originally a stone sculpture from ancient times.

Question 7

What is the name of the navy blue wheel found at the center of the Indian flag? It also appears separately on government seals.

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About Indian National Symbols

India's national symbols reach back further than almost any other country's, since several of them are copied directly from a stone carving that is more than 2,300 years old. The national emblem, four lions standing back to back, was adapted from a pillar built by the Buddhist emperor Ashoka around 250 BCE at Sarnath, the very place where Buddha is said to have given his first sermon.

The flag has its own dramatic backstory. Freedom fighter Pingali Venkayya first presented an early version of the design to Mahatma Gandhi in 1921, and it went through several changes before independence. The most important late change replaced a spinning wheel, a symbol of the independence movement itself, with the Ashoka Chakra, borrowed from the same ancient pillar as the emblem. The current design was adopted on July 22, 1947, just weeks before independence.

Unlike most countries, India officially recognizes two separate patriotic songs rather than just one. Jana Gana Mana is the national anthem, while Vande Mataram holds equal status as the national song, and both are treated as carrying the same level of importance despite serving different ceremonial roles. Remarkably, the anthem's writer, Rabindranath Tagore, also wrote the words to Bangladesh's national anthem, making him one of the only people in history tied to two different countries' anthems.

Several of India's animal symbols carry real conservation stories behind them. The Bengal tiger only became the national animal in 1972, replacing the Asiatic lion, the same year the government launched Project Tiger to protect the species. The Ganges river dolphin and the Indian elephant were named national symbols even more recently, in 2009 and 2010, specifically to help draw attention to threats facing India's rivers, forests, and wildlife.

Even the national motto carries a layer of ancient meaning. Satyameva Jayate, meaning "truth alone triumphs," comes from a Hindu text called the Mundaka Upanishad and appears directly beneath the national emblem on official documents and currency. Many of India's other plant and animal symbols, the lotus, the banyan tree, the mango, and the peacock, were likewise chosen because of a long, established place in Indian religion, art, and daily life rather than being invented for the occasion.

India's physical landmarks add a further, more visible layer to its symbol collection. The Taj Mahal in Agra, built as a tomb for a Mughal emperor's wife, remains the country's most internationally recognized monument, while India Gate in New Delhi honors soldiers who died fighting in the First World War. Neither building was designed as an official "national symbol" in the legal sense, but both function as instantly recognizable stand-ins for the country in photographs and postcards worldwide.

Taken together, India's symbols form an unusually deep, layered set: an emblem and a wheel both copied from the same 2,300-year-old carving, two co-equal patriotic songs instead of one, animals added to the list as recently as the last twenty years, and monuments recognized around the world despite never being formally declared as symbols at all.