My Editorial

Free, to set free
In an address delivered in Hyderabad early in May, President A.P.J. Kalam spoke about his three visions for India.
The first vision he envisaged was freedom. Freedom not just for India but for everyone. He asked: “In 3,000 years of our history, people from all over the world have come and invaded us, captured our lands, conquered our minds, looted us and took over what was ours. Yet we have not done this to any other nation. We have not conquered anyone. We have not grabbed anyone’s land or tried to enforce our way of life on them. Why?” His own answer to that question was: “Because we respect the freedom of others”.
The second is Development. Asserting that India is among the top five nations in the world in terms of GDP, the President said, “ it is time we see ourselves as a developed World.”
The third Vision was Strength. He said, “ India must stand up to the world. Unless India stands up to the world, no one will respect us. Only strength respects strength. We must be strong not only as military power but also as an economic power.”
The usual question about individual freedom keeps popping up very often particularly when someone bounces on us. But the great cultural history of India points out that we are individually liberated persons without any plans to keep anyone in bondage under us so as to feel superior to others. History shows that even when we waged war out of necessity we handed over the power to the respective nation and have walked out with dignity.
John W. Schroeder says, “ The more obligations we accept that are self imposed, the freer we are.” The following story is narrated by Richard Bach in the book Illusions. Once there lived a village of creatures along the bottom of a great crystal river. The current of the river swept silently over them all – young and old, rich and poor, good and evil, the current going its own way. “Each creature in its own manner clung tightly to the twigs and rocks of the river bottom, for clinging was their way of life, and resisting the current is what each had learned from birth. “But one creature said at last, ‘I am tired of clinging. I shall let go, and let the current take me where it will. Clinging, I shall die of boredom.’
The other creatures laughed and said, ‘Fool! Let go, and that current you worship will throw you tumbled and smashed across the rocks, and you will die quicker than boredom!’ But the one heeded them not, and taking a breath did let go, and at once was tumbled and smashed by the current across the rocks. “Yet in time, as the creature refuses to cling again, the current lifted him free from the bottom, and he was bruised and hurt no more. And the creatures downstream, to whom he was a stranger, cried, ‘See a miracle! A creature like ourselves, yet he flies! See the Messiah, come to save us all!’ And the one carried in the current said, ‘I am no more Messiah than you. The river delights to lift us free, if only we dare let go. Our true work is this voyage, this adventure.’ “But they cried the more, ‘Saviour!’ all the while clinging to the rocks, and when they looked again he was gone, and they were left alone making legends of a Saviour.”

Personal freedom does not depend on others. It is of our own making and choice. Freedom makes us more profoundly human. It sets us free and destroys the boundaries and limitations we have set within our minds. Freedom is so profound that it elevates us and compellingly elevates those around us without distinctions. Let us impose on each of us the value of freedom. This personal freedom will set the people of our nation free.