Independence Day India 2013 marked by a Google doodle
Independence Day India is the subject of Thursday's Google
doodle, on the occasion of India's 67th Independence Day. The doodle depicts a
tricolour ribbon, in the colours of the Indian flag - saffron, white and green.
15th August is celebrated as Independence Day across India to
mark the day that the country declared its independence from the British rule,
sixty-six years ago. India was
born as a sovereign nation on 15 August 1947, at the stroke of midnight, after
nearly two centuries of rule by the British.
The East India Company start ruling India after it defeated the
Nawab of Bengal and his French allies in the Battle of Plassey in 1757. The
company ruled India for hundred years, before it was forced to hand over the
reigns to the British Crown after the first revolt of Indian Independence in
1857.
The British Crown assumed direct control of India in 1858, and
passed a series of stricter, repressive laws that broke the proverbial back of
the local population. Unrest against the British Empire started rising, and the
arrival of Gandhi from South Africa gave the movement a much needed focal
point.
Gandhi became the symbol of the Independence movement, which was
built upon the ideas of non-violence, civil disobedience and non-cooperation.
The movement hit an upsurge during the late 1930s, and early 1940s, with India
frustrated at being dragged into the World War II, and pressing for a full
independence from the Empire, after earlier calls for partial self-rule.
Beaten down by the World War II, and the movement within India
that was now at its peak, the British Government finally decided to end the
British rule in India.
