A Rainy Republic Day

Diya and Aka lived in a small town called Cherrapunji. They were excited about watching the Republic Day Parade on the television.

- Ashima Kaushik

Grandpa had invited his friends to come over the next day and watch the parade together to celebrate. Diya and Aka were busy making flags to decorate the house.

"Orange colour is on top, and green at the bottom," Diya corrected Aka.

"The orange colour represents courage; white means peace and green is for growth. The blue chakra in the middle is for justice," said Grandpa as he handed them a bowl of roasted sweet potatoes.

"Is Delhi far?" Aka suddenly asked.

"If you look on the map, we are here, in the eastern part of India," Diya pointed in Grandpa's atlas book. "See, Delhi is all the way over here. In central Delhi is the India Gate, which is where the Republic Day parade happens every year on January 26." She tapped her fingers on the map.

"Why on January 26?" Aka asked, peeling a roasted sweet potato.

"Let me answer that," said Grandpa.

"Independence Day is the day of our nation's freedom from British rule and is celebrated on August 15 every year," he explained.

"I know, we got independence in the year 1947," Diya added.

Grandpa smiled and carried on, "Now after the independence, we as a free nation had to make our own set of rules and laws to run the country. So, the Indian Constitution was created. That rule book or the Indian Constitution came into effect on January 26, 1950. That day onwards, our own set of rules started being followed to maintain the law and order in India." Aka and Diya both nodded.

"So, Republic Day is the day on which the Constitution of India came into effect.

The first Republic Day parade happened in the year 1950," Diya said, excited.

"Because that was the first Republic Day!" Aka smiled, finishing his sweet potato.

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door.

It was their cousin Ajit, completely drenched. It was raining outside as usual.