The swastika (as a character 卐 or 卍) is an ancient religious icon used in the Indian subcontinent, East Asia and Southeast Asia, where it has been and remains a sacred symbol of spiritual principles in Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism.[1][2][3][4] In the Western world, it was historically a symbol of auspiciousness and good luck,[5] but in the 1930s, it became the main feature of Nazi symbolism as an emblem of Aryan race identity, and as a result, it has become stigmatized in the West by association with ideas of racism, hatred, and mass murder.
The name swastika comes from Sanskrit (Devanagari: स्वस्तिक), and denotes "conducive to well being or auspicious".[7][8] In Hinduism, the clockwise symbol is called swastika symbolizing surya (sun), prosperity, and good luck, while the counterclockwise symbol is called sauvastika symbolizing night or tantric aspects of Kali.[8] In Jainism, a swastika is the symbol for Suparshvanatha – the 7th of 24 Tirthankaras (spiritual teachers and saviours), while in Buddhism it symbolizes the auspicious footprints of the Buddha.
wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika