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A Very Timely Speech
by a Proactive President (Abdul Kalam)
"I have three visions for India. In 3000 years of our history,
people from all over the world have come and invaded us, captured
our lands, conquered our minds. From Alexander onwards, The
Greeks, the Turks, the Moguls, the Portuguese, the British,
the French, the Dutch, all of them came and looted us, took
over what was ours. Yet we have not done this to any other nation.
We have not conquered anyone. We have not grabbed their land,
their culture, and their history and tried to enforce our way
of life on them. Why? because we respect the freedom of others.
That is why my first vision is that of FREEDOM. I believe that
India got its first vision of this in 1857, when we started
the war of independence. It is this freedom that we must protect
and nurture and build on. If we are not free, no one will respect
us. My second vision for India is DEVELOPMENT. For fifty years
we have been a developing nation. It is time we see ourselves
as a developed nation. We are among top 5 nations of the world
in terms of GDP. We have 10 percent growth rate in most areas.
Our poverty levels are falling. Our achievements are being globally
recognized today. Yet we lack the self-confidence to see ourselves
as a developed nation, self-reliant and self-assured. Isn't
this incorrect? I have a THIRD vision. India must stand up to
the world. Because I believe that, unless India stands up to
the world, no one will respect us. Only strength respects strength.
We must be strong not only as a military power but also as an
economic power. Both must go hand-in-hand. My good fortune was
to have worked with three great minds. Dr. Vikram Sarabhai of
the Dept. of space, Professor Satish Dhawan, who succeeded him
and Dr.Brahm Prakash, father of nuclear material. I was lucky
to have worked with all three of them closely and consider this
the great opportunity of my life.
I see four milestones in my career: Twenty years I spent in
ISRO. I was given the opportunity to be the project director
for India's first satellite launch vehicle, SLV3, The one that
launched Rohini. These years played a very important role in
my life of Scientist. After my ISRO years, I joined DRDO and
got a chance to be the part of India's guided missile program.
It was my second bliss when Agni met its mission requirements
in 1994. The Dept. of Atomic Energy and DRDO had this tremendous
partnership in the recent nuclear tests, on May 11 and 13. This
was the third bliss. The joy of participating with my team in
these nuclear tests and proving to the world that India can
make it, that we are no longer a developing nation but one of
them. It made me feel very proud as an Indian. The fact that
we have now developed for Agni a re-entry structure, for which
we have developed this new material, a Very light material called
carbon-carbon. One day an orthopedic surgeon from Nizam Institute
of Medical Sciences visited my laboratory. He lifted the material
and found it so light that he took me to his hospital and showed
me his patients. There were these little girls and boys with
heavy metallic calipers weighing over three Kg. each, dragging
their feet around. He said to me: Please remove the pain of
my patients. In three weeks, we made these Floor reaction Orthosis
300-gram Calipers and took them to the orthopedic center. The
children didn't believe their eyes. From dragging around a three
kg load on their legs, they could now move around! Their parents
had tears in their eyes. That was my fourth bliss!
Why is the media here so negative? Why are we in India so embarrassed
to recognize our own strengths, our achievements? We are such
a great nation. We have so many amazing success stories but
we refuse to acknowledge them. Why? We are the first in milk
production.
We are number one in Remote sensing satellites. We are the
second largest producer of wheat. We are the second largest
producer of rice.
Look at Dr. Sudarshan, he has transferred the tribal village
into a self-sustaining, self-driving unit. There are millions
of such achievements but our media is only obsessed in the bad
news and failures and disasters. I was in Tel Aviv once and
I was reading the Israeli newspaper. It was the day after a
lot of attacks and bombardments and deaths had taken place.
The Hamas had struck. But the front page of the newspaper had
the picture of a Jewish gentleman who in five years had transformed
his desert land into an orchid and a granary. It was this inspiring
picture that everyone woke up to. The gory details of killings,
bombardments, deaths, were inside in the newspaper, buried among
other news. In India we only read about death, sickness, terrorism,
crime. Why are we so NEGATIVE? Another question: Why are we,
as a nation so obsessed with foreign things? We want foreign
TVs, we want foreign shirts, and we want foreign technology.
Why this obsession with everything imported. Do we not realize
that self-respect comes with self-reliance?
I was in Hyderabad giving this lecture, when a 14-year-old
girl asked me for my autograph. I asked her what her goal in
life is. She replied: I want to live in a developed India. For
her, you and I will have to build this developed India. You
must proclaim. India is not an under-developed nation; it is
a highly developed nation. Do you have 10 minutes? Allow me
to come back with a vengeance. Got 10 minutes for your country?
If yes, then read; otherwise, choice is yours.
* YOU say that our government
is inefficient.
* YOU say that our laws are too old.
* YOU say that the municipality does not pick up the garbage.
* YOU say that the phones don't work, the railways are a joke,
the airline is the worst in the world, and mails never reach
their destination.
* YOU say that our country has been fed to the dogs and is the
Absolute pits.
* YOU say, say and say.
* What do YOU do about it?
Take a person on his way to Singapore. Give him a name - YOURS.
Give Him a face - OURS. YOU walk out of the airport and you
are at your International best. In Singapore you don't throw
cigarette butts on the roads or eat in the stores. YOU are as
proud of their Underground Links as they are. You pay $5 (approx.
Rs.60) to drive through Orchard Road (equivalent of Mahim Causeway
or Pedder Road) between 5 PM and 8 PM. YOU comeback to the parking
lot to punch your parking ticket if you have over stayed in
a restaurant or a shopping mall irrespective of your status
identity. In Singapore you don't say anything, DO YOU? YOU wouldn't
dare to eat in public during Ramadan, in Dubai. YOU would not
dare to go out without your head covered in Jeddah. YOU would
not dare to buy an employee of the telephone exchange in London
at 10 pounds (Rs.650) a month to, "see to it that my STD
and ISD calls are billed to someone else." YOU would not
dare to speed beyond 55 mph (88 km/h) in Washington and then
tell the traffic cop, "Jaanta hai sala main kaun hoon (Do
you know who I am?). I am so and so's son. Take your two bucks
and get lost." YOU wouldn't chuck an empty coconut shell
anywhere other than the garbage pail on the beaches in Australia
and New Zealand. Why don't YOU spit Paan on the streets of Tokyo?
Why don't YOU use examination jockeys or buy fake certificates
in Boston? We are still talking of the same YOU. YOU who can
respect and conform to a foreign system in other countries but
cannot in your own. You who will throw papers and cigarettes
on the road the moment you touch Indian ground. If you can be
an involved and appreciative citizen in an alien country, why
cannot you be the same here in India? Once in an interview,
the famous Ex-municipal commissioner of Bombay, Mr.Tinaikar,
had a point to make. "Rich people's dogs are walked on
the streets to leave their affluent droppings all over the place,"
he said. "And then the same people turn around to criticize
and blame the authorities for inefficiency and dirty pavements.
What do they expect the officers to do? Go down with a broom
every time their dog feels the pressure in his bowels? In America
every dog owner has to clean up after his pet has done the job.
Same in Japan. Will the Indian citizen do that here?" He's
right. We go to the polls to choose a government and after that
forfeit all responsibility. We sit back wanting to be pampered
and expect the government to do everything for us whilst our
contribution is totally negative. We expect the government to
clean up but we are not going to stop chucking garbage all over
the place nor are we going to stop to pick a up a stray piece
of paper and throw it in the bin. We expect the railways to
provide clean bathrooms but we are not going to learn the proper
use of bathrooms. We want Indian Airlines and Air India to provide
the best of food and toiletries but we are not going to stop
pilfering at the least opportunity. This applies even to the
staff who is known not to pass on the service to the public.
When it comes to burning social issues like those related to
women, dowry, girl child and others, we make loud drawing room
protestations and continue to do the reverse at home. Our excuse?
"It's the whole system which has to change, how will it
matter if I alone forego my sons' rights to a dowry." So
who's going to change the system? What does a system consist
of? Very conveniently for us it consists of our neighbors, other
households, other cities, other communities and THE government.
But definitely not me and YOU. When it comes to us Actually
making a positive contribution to the system we lock ourselves
along with our families into a safe cocoon and look into the
distance at countries far away and wait for a Mr. Clean to come
along & work miracles for us with a majestic sweep of his
hand or we leave the country and run away. Like lazy cowards
hounded by our fears we run to America to bask in their glory
and praise their system. When New York becomes insecure we run
to England. When England experiences unemployment, we take the
next flight out to the Gulf. When the Gulf is war struck, we
demand to be rescued and brought home by the Indian government.
Everybody is out to abuse and rape the country. Nobody thinks
of feeding the system. Our conscience is mortgaged to money.
Dear Indians, The article is highly thought inductive, calls
for a great deal of introspection and pricks
one's conscience too.........
I am echoing J.F.Kennedy's words to his fellow Americans to
relate to Indians.....
"ASK WHAT WE CAN DO FOR INDIA AND DO WHAT HAS TO
BE DONE TO MAKE INDIA WHAT AMERICA AND OTHER WESTERN COUNTRIES
ARE TODAY"
Lets do what India needs from us.
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