[HELP]

"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 on-wards. 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, 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 the 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 economics 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 Sathish Dhawan, who succeded 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, SLV 3. 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 makes 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
Science 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 the 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 stones 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 T.Vs, we want foreign
shirts. 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 highly
developed nation.

INDIAN MUST READ THIS?.

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 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
airlines is the worst in the world, mails never reach their destination. You say
that our country has been fed to the dogs and is in 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 - YOURS. 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 Redder Road) between 5 PM and 8 PM. You come back 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 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 dont' You spit Pan on the streets of Tokyo? Why
don't You use examination jockeys or but 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. Maikar, 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 dogs 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
do everything for us. 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 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 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 is the whole system which
has to change, how will it matter if I alone forego my son's 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 no 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 experience unemployment, we take the next flight out of
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 had to be done to make India what America and other
western countries are today".

Lets do what India needs from us.

Thank
You,

DR. ABDUL KALAM

(President of India)

We take please in spreading
the great message of our president who is working and living with a Vision &
Mission to build a great India