I believe that it is necessary for all of us to work for unity of minds. The increasing intolerance for the views of others and increasing contempt for the way of life or religion of others, or the expression of these differences through lawless violence against people cannot be justified in any context. All of us have to work hard and do everything to protect the rights of every individual. That is the very foundation of the democratic values which I believe are our civilizational heritage and the very soul of our nation.
After I finished my two-day tour, the media wanted a message from me, for which a press meet was organized. I expressed my thoughts through a statement in which I urged the need for an intensified movement to completely eliminate communal and other forms of strife and bring about unity of minds.
Each individual has the fundamental right to practice his religious, cultural and language faith. We cannot do anything to disturb that.
10
AT HOME ABROAD
I am a world citizen,
Every citizen is my own kith and kin.
I have not been much of a foreign traveller as my hands were always full with time-bound national tasks throughout my professional career. As the first citizen of the country, however, receiving heads of state in India and honouring our own commitments by visiting foreign countries were official requirements. Whenever foreign delegations visited, the enthusiastic Rashtrapati Bhavan team worked hard to shower them with hospitality and present the accomplishments of our country. For me, the most important aspect of these visits was how to present the core competencies of our country and how to learn from the practices of other countries for our benefit. From this was born the concept of the World Knowledge Platform, which I developed in discussion with many specialists and dignitaries. We shared our concerns on environmental degradation and discussed the necessity of energy independence. We showed visitors Indian capabilities in IT, e-governance and pharmaceuticals. I was happy that every meeting or visit was geared towards implementing some mutually beneficial bilateral or multilateral programme.
Each of my visits abroad was important in its own way. In Sudan, discussions centred on building an oil pipeline from the southern part of the country to the capital Khartoum costing nearly a billion dollars in which India would cooperate. Today oil is flowing from Sudan to India. In Ukraine there was a very hectic programme. The visit resulted in advances in space cooperation. However, I give only a few highlights of those journeys. I went to South Africa in September 2004. President Thabo Mbeki requested that I address the Pan African Parliament, representing fifty-three African countries, in Johannesburg. I gladly accepted the request and as my team and I prepared for my speech, we pondered what we could offer to connect the African nations with India’s core competencies. This led to the emergence of the concept of the Pan African e-Network, which would provide education, health care and e-governance services from twelve universities and seventeen specialty hospitals from India and Africa and also connect all the presidents of the Pan African nations to enable smooth exchange of ideas between them.
The initial budgetary estimates by experts indicated that it would cost $50 million to $100 million to establish the e-Network. Before presenting the proposal to the Pan African Parliament, I briefed the prime minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, who felt that the proposal was in tune with the Focus Africa theme of the Government of India and would be a useful tool for cooperation between the Pan African countries and India.
The Pan African e-Network Project, which has now achieved considerable momentum, was formally inaugurated by the Government of India on 26 February 2009. Today, the e-Network has become a good example of fulfilling international social responsibility.
I think it was in 2006 that the president of the European Parliament, Josep Borrell Fontelles, called on me at Rashtrapati Bhavan. During our discussions, he talked to me at length about a topic that is close to my heart, the Evolution of Enlightened Citizens, which he had read about on my website. He asked me numerous questions on the subject. The questions were thoughtful, deep and purposeful. After our discussion, he invited me to address the European Parliament, which had 785 members representing twenty-seven member states of the European Union. The parliament is the only directly elected body of the European Union. He also requested that I address the parliament before his term as president ended in December 2006. However, because of my various commitments during 2006, I was unable to give the address till 25 April 2007. By that time Hans-Gert Pöttering had taken over as president from Fontelles.
As the address was an important one, I started preparing well before the commencement of my tour. I had several brainstorming sessions with friends, intellectuals, political leaders, scientists and the youth. I also composed a poem, ‘Message from Mother Earth’, especially for the occasion. The poem is a reflection on how the European nations, which went through many brutal wars as they fought one another, successfully converged to form the European Union with a focus on the economic development, prosperity, peace and happiness of all the member nations. It is indeed a pioneering initiative in regional cooperation.
When I reached the European Parliament on the morning of 25 April, I was welcomed by the president and his colleagues. It made for an impressive sight to see the 785 representatives of the European Union, and the overflowing visitor’s gallery.
My address on the occasion, titled ‘Dynamics of Unity of Nations’, emphasized the need for a confluence of civilizations, based on India’s historical experience, instead of a conflict of civilizations. My speech highlighted the evolution of enlightened citizenship, which has three components: education with a value system; religion transforming into spirituality; and societal transformation through national development. I also spoke on the necessity of achieving energy independence in India and Europe and outlined a mechanism for its realization. My lecture was cheered periodically. At the end of my address, I recited the poem that I had composed specifically for the occasion, with the permission of all the members.
MESSAGE FROM MOTHER EARTH
Beautiful environment leads
To beautiful minds;
Beautiful minds generate,
Freshness and creativity.
Created explorers of land and sea,
Created minds that innovate,
Created great scientific minds,
Created everywhere, why?
Gave birth to many discoveries,
Discovered a continent and unknown lands,
Ventured into unexplored paths,
Created new highways.
In the minds of the best,
Worst was also born;
Generated seeds of battle and hatred,
Hundreds of years of wars and blood.
Millions of my wonderful children,
Lost in the land and sea;
Tears flooded many nations,
Many engulfed in ocean of sadness.
Then, then came, the vision of European Union,
Took the oath,
Never to turn human knowledge,
Against ourselves or others.
United in their thinking,
Actions emanated,
To make Europe prosperous and peaceful,
Born, the European Union.
Those glad tidings captivated
The people everywhere.
Oh! European Union, let your missions,
Spread everywhere, like the air we breathe.
As I completed reading my poem, I was touched by the moving and spontaneous response from every member of the parliament. The standing ovation I received was indeed a tribute to our nation. In response, I conveyed the greetings of the one billion people of India to the citizens of the European Union countries. During his concluding remarks after my address, President Pöttering said, I quote, ‘Mr President Abdul Kalam, in the name of European Parliament, I want to thank you for this most important and inspiring speech. This was one of the extraordinary speeches we have ever heard from a statesman, scie
ntist and a poet. This is unique. All the best to this great nation India, all the best to our cooperation between the great nation India and the European Union, all the best Mr President.’
After my address, many members wanted to discuss specific aspects of the speech with me. The general observation was that India is a great nation and is rich in human values.
I consider my address at the European Parliament as a very important one in the context of promoting unity of minds throughout the world. My address was quoted in many countries and reached a global audience through numerous websites, including YouTube.
After I returned to India, I addressed Parliament and expressed the European Union’s willingness to work on a number of missions such as energy independence and building a World Knowledge Platform, so that India could take these initiatives forward.
When I went to Greece, I made a special trip to Socrates’ cave. People rarely go to this cave because it is in a hilly and difficult region. At my request, a visit was arranged. When I went there, I spent a few minutes in the cave with only a flickering light that I was given. I was alone for these five minutes. I was in a meditative mood. I wondered why Socrates, one of the greatest thinkers of the world, swallowed poison to take his own life. I remembered his words that the value of what he preached was more important than his life. Suddenly in that dark cave, one could see like a bright light the legacy of reason that he left to the world.
I went to Switzerland in 2005. When I landed, a surprise was awaiting me. The vice president, after receiving me, said that his country had declared 26 May 2005 as Science Day to commemorate my visit. This was indeed an unexpected gesture on the part of the Swiss government. When I met the president, I thanked him for it. He told me that he had read two of my books, Ignited Minds and India 2020. Impressed, he had briefed his cabinet on my accomplishments in space and defence science and the cabinet decided to celebrate my visit to Switzerland by declaring a Science Day. I had the opportunity while there to visit scientific laboratories and meet with researchers, students and academics. I also went to the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich, which was where Einstein first studied when he came from Germany. There I visited the Bose-Einstein laboratory where six scientists were working on Bose-Einstein condensate experiments. Here also I had the opportunity to address the faculty and students and talked on the topic ‘Technology and National Development’. I concluded my talk with Sir C.V. Raman’s exhortation to students, ‘We need a spirit of victory, a spirit that will carry us to our rightful place under the sun, a spirit which will recognize that we, as inheritors of a proud civilization, are entitled to a rightful place on this planet. If that indomitable spirit were to arise, nothing can hold us from achieving our rightful destiny.’
I cannot omit to mention Dr Nelson Mandela, whom I met in 2004. There are two big lessons one can learn from this great personality: The indomitability of the spirit and the virtue of forgiveness.
Cape Town is famous for its Table Mountain; it has got three peaks called Table Peak, Devil Peak, and Fake Peak. The peaks presented a beautiful sight throughout the day, as drifting clouds, sometimes dark and sometimes white, embraced their tops. We travelled to Robben Island from Cape Town by helicopter. When we reached the island, we were received by Ahmed Kathrada, a South African who was a co-prisoner with Dr Mandela. It surprised me to see the tiny room where Dr Mandela, who is six feet tall, was imprisoned for twenty-six years for fighting against apartheid. A major part of his life was spent on this island. He used to be taken for quarrying in the nearby mountain for a few hours in bright sun. This is when his sight got damaged. In spite of the torture he underwent his spirit remained indomitable. In that small room, when the wardens went to sleep, he wrote what eventually became a famous book, Long Walk to Freedom.
It was a great event for me to meet him in his house in Johannesburg. When I shook his hand, I felt that I was touching the hand of a mighty soul. When he got up he discarded the walking stick; I became his support. There is a big lesson that we can learn from him. It is there in one of the Thirukkurals too. ‘For those who do ill to you, the best punishment is to return good to them.’
My association with trains goes back to my childhood days, when I used to collect newspapers thrown from the train for distribution to Rameswaram town. Train journeys are a good way to see your land and smell its fragrance. Sometimes when the fog comes in there is a certain intimacy to the landscape as you see patches of fields and villages from up close. One can use the transit time to understand problems and find solutions to them. All in all, a train journey is quite pleasurable and I decided to activate the presidential train.
The Presidential Saloon consists of a pair of twin coaches that are reserved for exclusive use by the head of state. The coaches have a dining room that doubles as a visiting room, a lounge room or conference room and the president’s bedroom. There is also a kitchen and chambers for the president’s secretaries and staff as well as the railway staff who accompany him. The coaches are luxuriously appointed with teak furniture and silk drapes and cushion covers.
The coaches saw some use in the 1960s and early 1970s. There was even a tradition of having the president on the completion of his term use the coaches for his outbound journey from New Delhi to wherever he had decided to settle down. The last president to use the coaches in this way was Neelam Sanjiva Reddy, in 1977.
The coaches were not in use after that, an account of security concerns possibly, but maintenance was kept up. When I used the train on 30 May 2003 for a 60 km journey from Harnaut to Patna it was after twenty-six years that they were put to use. The coaches were renovated and provided with modern equipment such as satellite-based communication systems and I tried to make as much use of them as I could, thrice in all.
I made two other journeys. One was from Chandigarh to Delhi in 2004 and the third was from Delhi to Dehra Dun in 2006. These train journeys were necessitated due to uncertain weather and also because the travel time could be well used for meetings.
The journey from Harnaut to Patna became a multipurpose journey. I laid the foundation stone for the new railway workshop at Harnaut. Nitish Kumar, who was railway minister, was very happy and all smiles at seeing a huge railway complex being launched in his home state. In my address, I told the audience at Harnaut that I was just arriving from an ancient site of learning, Nalanda. I hoped that Bihar would revive this great university with a new, contemporary curriculum that included subjects dealing with promoting peace in the world.
The train journey was immensely useful as I invited fifteen vice chancellors of Bihar to travel with me and discuss for an hour the problems pertaining to the universities in the state.
I could emphasize to them the necessity of the universities taking up courses which had direct relevance to the development programmes of the state. The governor of Bihar took a special interest in solving the problems which were affecting the performance of the universities and bringing them on a par with other universities in the country. After two years, I found that they had achieved the goal for conduct of calendar-based examinations.
There was a pleasant footnote to the journey. At the Patna railway station I saw Lalu Prasad Yadav, the leader of the Rashtriya Janata Dal, and the Janata Dal (United) leader Nitish Kumar, who had come to receive me, but both were looking in different directions. As soon as I got down from the train, I brought both the political rivals together and made them shake hands, much to the delight of the crowd assembled there.
On 5 January 2004, I went to Chandigarh for inaugurating the Children’s Science Congress and also to address the scientific community. I had to come back to Delhi for another important task scheduled on 6 January. To overcome the uncertainty arising from early morning fog, I used the train to reach Delhi in time. Particularly I enjoyed inaugurating the science congress where students from all parts of the country numbering more than a thousand had assembled with their projects.
The third time I travelled by tra
in was in 2006. I went to Dehra Dun for taking the presidential salute at the passing out parade at the Indian Military Academy. It was winter and due to poor visibility in the mornings, reaching by air in time for the parade was uncertain. It was foggy at night too. The train went from the Safdarjung station to Dehra Dun non-stop, but the railways had arranged a number of checkpoints to ensure its safe movement.
It was pleasant to be among the cheerful graduating officers. Particularly, many graduating officers asked me questions on what type of India they were going to defend. To this group of officers, I related something that came up on a visit to some northern command units, very close to the border. The visit was being closely watched by the Pakistani army personnel across the border. There I addressed around two hundred young officers belonging to different units. After my address, before going for Bada Khana, I put a question to the young officers. Dear young officers, I said, since you have more than thirty years of service in front of you in the army, can you tell me what is the unique mission you would like to accomplish as an officer. The senior officers were silent but the younger ones lifted their hands. I chose one. After saluting me, the officer said, ‘Sir, I have a dream. That dream is to get back all the land belonging to my nation which has been occupied by others.’ The whole meeting was electrified and everyone cheered that young officer. When I narrated this answer to the graduating cadets, there was the same response: ‘We will also do that, sir.’ The train journeys linger in memory for these reasons.