Short answers, pulled from the story.
Dharma derives from the Sanskrit root dhr-, meaning to hold or to support, and is related to the Latin firmus (firm, stable). It carries meanings including law, duty, righteousness, order, and the right way of living. Karl Friedrich Geldner required 20 different English words to translate dharma across its uses in the Rigveda alone.
According to Pandurang Vaman Kane, author of the History of Dharmashastra, the word dharma appears at least fifty-six times in the hymns of the Rigveda. The related form dharman appears sixty-three times in the same text, according to scholar Brereton.
In the 3rd century BCE, the Mauryan Emperor Ashoka translated dharma as eusebeia, a Greek word meaning piety, spiritual maturity, or godliness. This translation appears in the Kandahar Bilingual Rock Inscription, which dates to 258 BCE and was discovered in Afghanistan in the mid-20th century.
In Hinduism, dharma refers to cosmic law, individual moral duty, and the principles that sustain social and natural order. In Buddhism, dharma (dhamma in Pali) refers primarily to the teachings of the Buddha, especially the discourses on the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path, as well as the ultimate nature of reality.
Dharmastikaya is a term unique to Jain ontology that refers to the principle of motion, one of six dravya (substances) that constitute reality. It is not a moral concept but a physical one: the enabling condition for movement through space. This use of the term dharma is not found in Buddhism or the schools of Hinduism.
India chose the Ashoka Chakra, a depiction of the dharmachakra or wheel of dharma, as the central motif on its national flag in 1947. The choice reflects the importance of dharma to Indian civilisation across more than three millennia.