Freedom Of India Quotes & Sayings

Propelled by freedom of faith, gender equality and economic justice for all, India will become a modern nation. Minor blemishes cannot cloak the fact that India is becoming such a modern nation: no faith is in danger in our country, and the continuing commitment to gender equality is one of the great narratives of our times. — Pranab Mukherjee

If any Englishman dedicated his life to securing the freedom of India, resisting tyranny and serving the land, I should welcome that Englishman as an Indian. — Mahatma Gandhi

She had talked of this at length with Kadambari - Mrs. Dutt: Why should it not be possible for these freedoms to be universally available for women everywhere? And Mrs. Dutt had said that of course, this was one of the great benefits of British rule in India; that it had given women rights and protections that they'd never had before. At this, Uma had felt herself, for the first time, falling utterly out of sympathy with her new friend. She had known instinctively that this was a false argument, unfounded and illogical. How was it possible to imagine that one could grant freedom by imposing subjugation? that one could open a cage by pushing it inside a bigger cage? How could any section of a people hope to achieve freedom where the entirety of a populace was held in subjection? — Amitav Ghosh

To prosper, a zoo needs parliamentary government, democratic elections, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of association, rule of law and everything else enshrined in India's Constitution. Impossible to enjoy the animals otherwise. Long-term, bad politics is bad for business. — Yann Martel

The Charkha in the hands of a poor widow brings a paltry price to her, in the hands of Jawaharlal; it is an instrument of India's freedom. — Mahatma Gandhi

We ask the great masses of India to be patient a short time longer, while the cause of freedom is being fought out, not because we want to delay, but because the hard facts of war make a complete change impossible at the moment. — Stafford Cripps

The Islamic conquest of India is probably the bloodiest story in history. It is a discouraging tale, for its evident moral is that civilization is a precious good, whose delicate complex of order and freedom, culture and peace, can at any moment be overthrown by barbarians invading from without or multiplying within. — Will Durant

I have that precious commodity - freedom. I can live my life a day at a time, and I am open to whatever the next day brings. I know I sound as if I have been off with some guru in India, but I haven't. I've come to realise the value of being able to decide for oneself. — Cherie Lunghi

For my own part, I do not want the freedom of India if it means extinction of English or the disappearance of Englishmen. — Mahatma Gandhi

All that we have invented, the symbols in the church, the rituals, they are all put there by thought. Thought has invented these things. Invented the savior. Invented the temples of India and the contents of the temples. Thought has invented all these things called sacred. You cannot deny that. So thought in itself is not sacred. And when thought invents God, God is not sacred. So what is sacred? That can only be understood or happen when there is complete freedom, from fear, from sorrow, and when there is this sense of love and compassion with it's own intelligence. Then when the mind is utterly still, that which is sacred can take place. — Jiddu Krishnamurti

We are in a strange kind of time, where the kind of liberation movements such as anti-apartheid movements and freedom struggles in India need to be reinvented. We need to retool them so that all the gains that our generation has made can be passed on to future generations. — Vandana Shiva

Let me remind you that you have a two-fold task to perform. With the force of arms and at the cost of your blood you will have to win liberty. Then, when India is free, you will have to organize the permanent army of Free India, whose task it will be to preserve our liberty for all time. We must build up our national defense on such an unshakable foundation that never again in our history shall we lose our freedom. — Subhas Chandra Bose

The sword of revolution is sharpened on the whetting stone of ideas-bhagat singh in court during his trial, india's struggle for freedom — Bhagat Singh

In India, all along, development as a process was always affected from the top down style of functioning. Naturally, because along with our freedom we had inherited a bureaucracy, which was designed by the British to rule, not to serve. The British way of doing things had always been to get things done through a government department and after independence we Indians merely continued this system. — Verghese Kurien

At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom, — Ramachandra Guha

Freedom is for the educated people who fought for it. We were slaves of the English, now we will be slaves of the educated Indians - or the Pakistanis. — Khushwant Singh

Good books are rare, and to have a really good library, a few shelves are all we need. When I was still on my campus in India, I was convinced, like many professors, that if the Lord was to be found anywhere, it was in the lower stacks of the library. But now - just as when I go into a big department store, I can say, "How many things I don't need! How many expensive suits I don't want!" - when I enter a big library I say, "What tomes I don't have to read again! What folios I will never open!" This feeling of freedom will come to all of us when we realise, in the depths of our meditation, that all wisdom lies within. — Eknath Easwaran

I would far rather that India perished than that she won Her freedom at the sacrifice of truth. — Mahatma Gandhi

Cleanliness is a freedom movement for an aspiring Nation. Culture of cleanliness will influence the heygine, health, asthetics and natural setting of the nation, which is a new age currency of a country. — Vishwas Chavan

I believe in an India of pluralism and diversity, not of religious bigotry and caste politics. I believe in an India that is secure in itself and confident of its place in the world, an India that is a proud example of tolerance, freedom and hope for the downtrodden. — Shashi Tharoor

In India we're fighting to retain a wilderness that we have. Whereas in the west, it's gone. Every person that's walking down the street is a walking bar code. You can tell where their clothes are from, how much they cost, which designer made which shoe, which shop you bought each item from. Everything is civilized and tagged and valued and numbered and put in it's place. Whereas in India, the wilderness still exists-the unindoctrinated wilderness of the mind, full of untold secrets and wild imaginings. — Arundhati Roy

Freedom of India will demonstrate to all the exploited races of the earth that their freedom is very near. — Mahatma Gandhi

But what is our ultimate goal? We want freedom of thought, freedom of action, freedom to fashion our own destiny and build up an India - suited to the genius of her people. We do not wish to make of India a cheap and slavish imitation of the West. We have so far sought to liberalise our government on the Western model. Whether that will satisfy us in the future I cannot say.31 — Savita Narain

During freedom struggle, It were authors and artists who made the Nation stand with their pen, and now their pen can create an environment of renaissance when Independent India is on the path of Good Governance. — Narendra Modi

Only about 10 percent of India's population uses the web, making it unlikely that Internet freedom will be a decisive ballot-box issue anytime soon. — Rebecca MacKinnon

Before I was married, I thought the sound of bangles jangling on my forearms would be delightful. I looked forward to being able to wear bells around my ankles and silver necklaces around my neck, but not any more, not since I had learned what they represented for the man who gave them. A necklace was no prettier than a piece of of rope that ties a goat to a tree, depriving it of freedom. — Phoolan Devi

Nehru, speaking of his country's dreams, said: 'Those dreams are for India, but they are also for the world, for all the nations and peoples are too closely knit together today for any one of them to imagine that it can live apart. Peace has been said to be indivisible; so is freedom, so is prosperity now, and so also is disaster in this One World that can no longer be split into isolated fragments.' It — Shashi Tharoor

A tyrst with destiny - A the stroke of midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awaken to life and Freedom — Jawaharlal Nehru

I will only say that many freedom fighters of India found their calling in the institutions of Britain. And many makers of modern India, including several of my distinguished predecessors, from Jawaharlal Nehru to Dr. Manmohan Singh, passed through their doors. — Narendra Modi

Blood and tears are going to be our lot, whether we like them or not. Our blood and tears will flow; maybe the parched soil of India needs them so that the fine flower of freedom may grow again. — Jawaharlal Nehru

I declare it well befits me to thank our God for simpler pleasures than these, than teak or gold or India cloth. Daily, in my youth, should not I have fallen upon my knees and thanked Him who died for us upon the Cross for the warmth of kindled fires, for the freedom to swing my hands in the air? Should I not have praised Him for the liberty to open doors and pass through them, for the escape from drudgery, and most, my mother's hand to hold? — M T Anderson

I would not sell the vital interests of the untouchables for the sake of winning the freedom of India. — Mahatma Gandhi

Our government doesn't necessarily agree with Wilson's Fourteen Points." Maud nodded. "I suppose we're against point five, about colonial peoples having a say in their own government." "Exactly. What about Rhodesia, and Barbados, and India? We can't be expected to ask the natives' permission before we civilize them. Americans are far too liberal. And we're dead against point two, freedom of the seas in war and peace. — Ken Follett

Long years ago, we made a tryst with destiny, and now the time comes when we shall redeem our pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but very substantially. At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance — Jawaharlal Nehru

Als it is hard for America to fight wars in the name of freedom, if those people themselves choose for nonfreedom. Can America and England save India from communism, if they vote communist themselves. — Oswald Mosley

Through realization of freedom of India, I hope to realize and carry on the mission of brotherhood of man. — Mahatma Gandhi

The freedom fighters in India's long struggle for independence from British rule, or members of the African National Congress, were once classed as terrorists. History, as they say, is written by victors, but history also has many cunning corridors - how much time must elapse before all those tricky side-passages are revealed? — Neel Mukherjee

If overpopulation or lack of resources created poverty, then Hong Kong should be poor. Hong Kong has 20 times as many people per square mile as India, and no valuable natural resources. Yet Hong Kong is rich; the average income there is higher than in Great Britain or Canada. This is a recent development. In the 1920s, Hong Kong was as poor as India. But in a relatively short time it became rich because of one key ingredient: economic freedom. — John Stossel

The all-or-nothing quality of Poonja-ji's teaching obliged him to acknowledge the full enlightenment of any person who was grandiose or manic enough to claim it. Thus, I repeatedly witnessed fellow students declare their complete and undying freedom, all the while appearing quite ordinary - or worse. In certain cases, these people had clearly had some sort of breakthrough, but Poonja-ji's insistence upon the finality of every legitimate insight led many of them to delude themselves about their spiritual attainments. Some left India and became gurus. From what I could tell, Poonja-ji gave everyone his blessing to spread his teachings in this way. — Sam Harris

Do you know about Hanuman, sir? He was the faithful servant of the god Rama, and we worship him in our temples because he is a shining example of how to serve your masters with absolute fidelity, love, and devotion.
These are the kinds of gods they have foisted on us Mr. Jiabao. Understand, now, how hard it is for a man to win his freedom in India. — Aravind Adiga

Independence was worked for by people more or less at the top; the freedom it brought has worked its way down. People everywhere have ideas now of who they are and what they owe themselves. The process quickened with the economic development that came after independence; what was hidden in 1962, or not easy to see, what perhaps was only in a state of becoming, has become clearer. The liberation of spirit that has come to India could not come as release alone. In India, with its layer below layer of distress and cruelty, it had to come as disturbance. It had to come as rage and revolt. India was now a country of a million little mutinies. — V.S. Naipaul

India was and to some extent, still is, a nation where its citizens care more about their religious freedom than any other earthly possession. Give them food or not, it doesn't matter to them, as long as they are allowed to practice their religion. But, take away their religion, they will fight till the last breath of their life. — Abhijit Naskar

Khadi to me is the symbol of unity of Indian humanity, of its economic freedom and equality and, therefore, ultimately, in the poetic expression of Jawaharlal Nehru, 'the livery of India's freedom'. — Mahatma Gandhi

The roots of India's soft power run deep. India's is a civilization that, over millennia, has offered refuge and, more importantly, religious and cultural freedom, to Jews, Parsis, several varieties of Christians, and Muslims. — Shashi Tharoor

The aim of life is no more to control the mind, but to develop it harmoniously; not to achieve salvation here after, but to make the best use of it here below; and not to realise truth, beauty and good only in contemplation, but also in the actual experience of daily life; social progress depends not upon the ennoblement of the few but on the enrichment of democracy; universal brotherhood can be achieved only when there is an equality of opportunity - of opportunity in the social, political and individual life. - from Bhagat Singh's prison diary, p. 124 — Bhagat Singh

Nothing depends upon the death of an individual, be he ever so great, but much depends upon the freedom of India. — Mahatma Gandhi

Proving one's innocence is as improbable as going to Pluto for
a honeymoon. It could take away everything you had in life, dear
ones, dreams, hopes and, most importantly, the right to have your
freedom. — Sheeja Jose

The plan to carve up British India was never approved of or accepted by Gandhi ... who realised too late that his closest comrades and disciples were more interested in power than principle, and that his own vision had long been clouded by the illusion that the struggle he led for India's freedom was a nonviolent one. — Stanley Wolpert

If farmers become weak the country loses self-reliance but if they are strong, freedom also becomes strong. If we do not maintain our progress in agriculture, poverty cannot be eliminated from India.But our biggest poverty alleviation programme is to improve the living standard of our farmers. The thrust of our poverty alleviation programmes is on the uplift of the farmers. — Rajiv Gandhi

During the twenty-one year rule of Amir Abdul Rahman (1880-1901), one of Afghanistan's more pro-British rulers, only one school was built in Kabul, and that was a madrassa. Condemned to play a passive part in an imperial Great Game, Afghanistan missed out on the indirect benefits of colonial rule, the creation of an educated class such as would supply the basic infrastructure of the postcolonial states of India, Pakistan and Egypt.

Afghanistan's resolute backwardness in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was appealing to Western romantics. Kipling, who was repelled by the educated Bengali, commended the Pashtun tribesmen- the traditional rulers of Afghanistan and also a majority among Afghans- for their courage, love of freedom, and sense of honour. These cliches about the Afghans, which would be amplified in our own time by American journalists and politicians, also had some effect on Muslims themselves. — Pankaj Mishra