On the occasion of 71st anniversary of our country’s independence, the Prime Minister made the traditional speech from the stately ramparts of the historical Red Fort. Seven decades of independence are full of great events in our nation. We have many achievements and some failure also. Keeping in mind the contemporary history of the world in general and of Asia in particular, we must be thankful that we were blessed with great and visionary leaders, wise and steeped in human values who steered the ship of the nation through storms and tempests with courage, determination and foresight.
It was no small a decision to adopt parliamentary democracy as the form of Government for this nation. Likewise, the decision of making India a union of federating units where distribution of powers is clearly stated and exercised makes it a unique country.In terms of population, languages, religions, cultures and life style and also in terms of geography and topography India is a union of so many countries.Evidently, problems and aspirations of each federating unit cannot be the same as of another unit. Yet our constitutional fathers gave us a federal constitution that serves a beacon light to us in times of political crisis. They drew inspiration from great Indian civilizational fund which is replete with wisdom, humanism and the ideal of peaceful coexistence. Vasudevamkutumbakam reflects the philosophy of citizen of the world.
And in our opinion the main and the most outstanding theme of Prime Minister’s address was his appeal to the people of the country to shun divisive thinking and remain united to achieve the broad targets of this great nation, of economic development and wiping tears of people in distress. In a country whose polity is based on the concept of world citizenship it becomes a contradiction to make discrimination among people on one or the other count. No Prime Minister of India can deviate from the fundamentals of this philosophy. In his address Prime Minister Modi has asked the nation not to lose the sight of those principles.
We have travelled a long distance ever since our freedom. Today India is respected by all countries of the world as the voice of sanity. Today many countries feel that India has a role to lead the world through the light of wisdom and tolerance. Today the world powers are eager to know what India says and thinks about human affairs. Those of us who have been keeping track of history of past couple of years will agree that we are at a far better position in terms of economy and inter-national relationship.
India has the capacity to take hard decisions when national interests and sovereignty are involved. It is often said that India should stick to the principle of non-violence as was preached by the father of the nation. But we should not forget that he had also said that non-violence did not mean surrendering to falsehood and threat to the integrity and sovereignty of the nation. We have felt the need of securing our borders and we are also determined to make ourselves strong and invincible so that we are able to carry forward the programme for peace and development.
Unfortunately some of our people have not been able to grasp the virtue and the power of our secular democratic dispensation. It is because of lack of understanding or because of vested interests out to mislead unsuspecting people. Their opposition cannot pull down the structure which the nation has so assiduously raised. Those who have strayed away from national mainstream will need to do some introspection. The real threat to our integrity is from internal subversion. The threat is of divided society or the society marred by internal dissensions. The people of this country have great potential. It should be put to positive service of the nation. Patriotism does not come from challenging the patriotism of others but by strengthening one’s patriotism. The message of the Prime Minister is loaded with meaning and we hope countrymen will try to understand the words of wisdom for their own benefit and guidance.
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