Recently, the Vice President and Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar said Parliament is the North Star of democracy, whereas the Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud called the basic structure doctrine a “North Star”.
- Here, both VP Dhankar and CJI Chandrachud have used the metaphor of the North Star to refer to something constant/permanent that leads and provides direction.
What is the North Star?
- Polaris, also known as the North Star or the Pole Star, is a very bright star (around 2500 times more luminous than our sun) placed less than 1° away from the north celestial pole along our planet’s rotational axis. This is the imaginary line that extends through the planet and out of the north and south poles. Earth rotates around this line, like a spinning top.
- Since Polaris lies nearly in a direct line with the Earth’s rotational axis “above” the North Pole, it stands almost motionless in the night sky, with all the stars of the northern sky appearing to rotate around it. This makes it an excellent fixed point from which to draw measurements for celestial navigation.
- Its position and brightness have made humans use it for navigation since late antiquity.
- It is a part of the constellation Ursa Minor and is around 323 light-years away from Earth.
- Simply the elevation of the star above the horizon gives the approximate latitude of the observer and in the northern hemisphere, if you can see Polaris you can always tell which way is north (and, by extension, which ways are south, east and west).
(Sources: NASA and Indian Express)
