Basanti, the yellow of mustard flowers, is spring and is worn at Basant and is the colour of the Sikh nishan sahib in mainstream practice. It is also the colour associated with sacrifice, from the phrase basanti chola.
Surmai, deep blue, is the Nihang colour and the colour of the Khalsa in its martial aspect.
Red is the bride's colour, in the chooda, the salu and the wedding dupatta, and is also the colour of the phulkari's ground.
White is worn by widows in some Punjabi Hindu communities and by men at funerals in others, and Sham Singh Attariwala Ji put on white before Sobraon, meaning he did not intend to come back.
Green is associated with Islam and with fertility, and appears on Muslim shrines across Punjab including those maintained by Sikh and Hindu villagers.
None of these associations is fixed by rule and all of them are read instantly by anyone in the room.
The colours carry meanings that are used without being stated. Saffron for the panth, blue for the Nihangs, red for a bride, white for mourning and for the old, green in the Muslim west.
Phulkari uses a limited palette of golden yellow, crimson, orange and white on a rust or indigo ground, and the combinations are regional.
The dye trade was local and vegetable based until the late nineteenth century, when synthetic dyes came in through Amritsar and Ludhiana and changed the palette within a generation.