The Khanda () is the symbol of the

Sikhism Sikhism is an Indian religion and Indian philosophy, philosophy that originated in the Punjab region of the Indian subcontinent around the end of the 15th century CE. It is one of the most recently founded major religious groups, major religio ...

which attained its current form around the 1930s during the

Ghadar Movement The Ghadar Movement or Ghadar Party was an early 20th-century, international political movement founded by expatriate Panjabi s to overthrow British rule in India. Many of the Ghadar Party founders and leaders, including Sohan Singh Bhakna, wen ...

Description

The modern Sikh symbol is never written on or in any copy of the

Guru Granth Sahib The Guru Granth Sahib (, ) is the central holy religious scripture of Sikhism, regarded by Sikhs as the final, sovereign and eternal Guru following the lineage of the ten human gurus of the religion. The Adi Granth (), its first rendition, w ...

. The main symbol traditionally used in the Guru Granth Sahib and

Gurdwara A gurdwara or gurudwara () is a place of assembly and place of worship, worship in Sikhism, but its normal meaning is "place of guru" or "home of guru". Sikhism, Sikhs also refer to gurdwaras as ''Gurdwara Sahib''. People from all faiths and rel ...

s around the world is "

Ik Onkar Ik Onkar, also spelled Ek Onkar or Ik Oankaar ( Gurmukhi: or ; ); literally, "one ''God''", hence interpreted as "There is only one God or one Creator") is a phrase in Sikhism that denotes the one supreme reality. It is a central tenet of Sikh r ...

". Traditionally, it was very common to see "Ik Onkar" above the entrance to a Gurdwara, or on the front page of the Guru Granth Sahib. The other one was the Aad Chand. It is an amalgam of 3 symbols: * A double-edged

khanda (sword) The khanda () is a double-edge straight sword originating from the Indian subcontinent. The Rajput warrior clans venerated the khanda as a weapon of great prestige. It is often featured in religious iconography, theatre and art depicting the anci ...

in the centre * A ''chakkar'' (

chakram The chakram (; ) is a throwing weapon from the Indian subcontinent. It is circular with a sharpened outer edge and a diameter of . It is also known as ''chalikar'' meaning "circle", and was sometimes referred to in English writings as a "war- qu ...

) * Two single-edged daggers, or

kirpan The kirpan (; pronunciation: Help:IPA/Punjabi, ɪɾpaːn is a blade that Khalsa Sikhs are required to wear as part of their religious uniform, as prescribed by the Rehat, Sikh Code of Conduct. Traditionally, the kirpan was a full-sized '' ...

, crossed at the bottom, which sit on either side of the khanda and chakkar. They represent the dual characteristics of '' Miri-Piri'', indicating the integration of both spiritual and temporal sovereignty together and not treating them as two separate and distinct entities. The left sword is called Miri and the right sword is called Piri. It depicts the Sikh doctrine '' Deg Tegh Fateh'' in emblematic form. It consists of three weapons and a circle: the

khanda Khanda may refer to: Places * Khanda, Sonipat, a large historical village in Sonipat district of Haryana, India * Khanda, Jind, a village in Jind district of Haryana, India * Khanda Kheri, a village in Hansi Tehsil of Hisar district of Haryana, ...

, two

s and the chakkar which is a sharp circular throwing weapon. Deg Teg Fateh (), or Victory to Charity and Arms) is a Sikh slogan and the title of an anthem in the Punjabi language that signifies the dual obligations of the Khalsa: The responsibility to provide food, and to provide protection, for the needy and oppressed. Deg refers to the "cauldron" and Tegh to the "sword". The cauldron or kettle symbolizes charity and is a reference to the Sikh religious obligation to provide langar, the free distribution of food, to all people, irrespective of an individual's religion, caste or ethnicity. The sword, or (kirpan), represents the warrior code of the Khalsa. The Khanda icon conveys these two principles. It is the military emblem of the Sikhs. It is also part of the design of the ''

Nishan Sahib The Nishan Sahib (), also known as the Sikh flag, is used to represent the Sikh people worldwide. In 1936, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee ratified the Rehat, Sikh Rehet Maryada, which states its colour as either basanti (xanthic) ...

''. A double-edged

is placed at the top of a Nishan Sahib flag as an ornament or

finial A finial () or hip-knob is an element marking the top or end of some object, often formed to be a decorative feature. In architecture, it is a small decorative device, employed to emphasize the Apex (geometry), apex of a dome, spire, tower, roo ...

. In recent years, the Khanda has been used to show solidarity within the Sikh community after high-profile shootings in the United States. Another symbol that may be confused with the Khanda is the ''aad chand'' () of the

Nihang The Nihang (also spelt as Nihung lit. "Crocodiles") or Akali (lit. "Immortals"), also known as '' Dal Khalsa'', is an armed Sikh warrior order originating in the Indian subcontinent. Nihangs are believed to have originated either from Fateh Sin ...

, which consists of a ''khanda'' sword in the middle of a crescent, aligned with points upward.

Character encodings and emoji

The symbol is encoded in

Unicode Unicode or ''The Unicode Standard'' or TUS is a character encoding standard maintained by the Unicode Consortium designed to support the use of text in all of the world's writing systems that can be digitized. Version 16.0 defines 154,998 Char ...

, at code point in the

Miscellaneous Symbols Miscellaneous Symbols is a Unicode block (U+2600–U+26FF) containing glyphs representing concepts from a variety of categories: astrological, astronomical, chess, dice, musical notation, political symbols, recycling, religious symbols, trig ...

block, and at in the

Symbols and Pictographs Extended-A Symbols and Pictographs Extended-A is a Unicode block containing emoji characters. It extends the set of symbols included in the Supplemental Symbols and Pictographs block. All of the characters in the Symbols and Pictographs Extended-A block a ...

block; the latter was added in Unicode 15.0 in 2022, and defaults to colour

emoji An emoji ( ; plural emoji or emojis; , ) is a pictogram, logogram, ideogram, or smiley embedded in text and used in electronic messages and web pages. The primary function of modern emoji is to fill in emotional cues otherwise missing from type ...

presentation. The approach of using a separate code point, rather than using an emoji variation sequence, was taken in this case since the use of variation sequences for emoji is now regarded as having been a mistake to begin with, although

Samsung Samsung Group (; stylised as SΛMSUNG) is a South Korean Multinational corporation, multinational manufacturing Conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered in the Samsung Town office complex in Seoul. The group consists of numerous a ...

had already implemented a colour glyph for since 2013.

References

{{Sikhism Sikh symbols