New Delhi: The Central Government has imposed a ban on import of tricolour from China and other countries. The Directorate General of Foreign Trade on October 11 issued a notification, banning the import of the Indian national flag “not adhering to specifications prescribed” in the Flag Code of India.
According to the Flag Code of India, the tricolour can only be made of hand-spun and handwoven wool, cotton, silk khadi “bunting”. But most of the flags that we see being sold at traffic signals or outside a school are either made of plastic or non-khadi fabric and shipped from across the border.
This led to a severe decline in the sale of tricolour made by Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC). The Government now hopes the ban on import will help the KVIC to boost production of tricolour.
During 2017-18, KVIC’s flag sales were estimated at Rs 3.7 crore. In 2018-19, it declined by 14 per cent to Rs 3.2 crore.
This variation had urged the Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal to ban the import of flags from China and other countries last month.
Upon the KVIC’s request, the government has now banned the import of tricolour allowing only the Khadi and Village Industries Commission to manufacture national flags.
