Abdul Kalam Best Quotes

The best brains of the nation may be found on the last benches of the classroom.

the best way to win was to not need to win. The best performances are accomplished when you are relaxed and free of doubt.

One best book is equal to hundred good friends but one good friend is equal to a library

I reminded myself that the best way to win was to not need to win. The best performances are accomplished when you are relaxed and free of doubt.

One best book is equal to hundred good friends but one good friend is equal to a library.

Never be afraid of the hell , because one who lives in hell knows the best ways to face the difficulties...!!

Look at the sky. We are not alone. The whole universe is friendly to us and conspires only to give the best to those who dream and work

The best performances are accomplished when you are relaxed and free of doubt.

action.

      Where there is righteousness in the heart, There is beauty in the character. When there is beauty in the character, There is harmony in the home. When there is harmony in the home, There is order in the nation. When there is order in the nation, There is peace in the world.

Stories of perseverance and extraordinary courage always inspire me. This piece in a book called Everyday Greatness by Stephen R. Covey has remained with me ever since.

I reminded myself that the best way to win was to not need to win. The best performances are accomplished when you are relaxed and free of doubt. I

How could they afford to pay the sum of 600 that was the admission fee at MIT?

concede defeat in the mind, he seems

India

British.

British. My mother

one,

That day I learnt two lessons: a teacher who has his or her student's progress in mind is the best possible friend, because the teacher knows how to make sure that you excel. And second, there is no such thing as an impossible deadline. I have worked on many tough assignments, some of which had the country's top leaders watching over my work, but the assurance I gained in my capabilities at MIT thanks to Professor Srinivasan, helped me later in life too.

Don’t pretend to be a candle, be a moth. Know the power hidden in serving. We seem to have got stuck with external forms of politics and mistaking them to be nation-building. It is the sacrifices, toil and valour that and seldom shown or seen that truly makes a nation.

I strongly believe that teachers need to tell students about great lives and make children understand their history and heritage. It is only through this that a love for the country is born that is based on knowledge and understanding. This is how children not only know what is good and what is evil but also learn to judge for themselves the distinction between the two. They then know the best way to behave in many situations. These lessons can form the moral core around which our personalities are formed—something that no one can take away from us however old we get.

Prof. Sarabhai's approach to mistakes rested on the assumption that they were inevitable but generally manageable. It was in the handling of the crises that arose as a consequence that talent could often be revealed. I later realised by experience, that the best way to prevent errors was to anticipate them.

Normally, when the petitions from the citizens reached the Public-1 Section, for twenty petitions to get a decision, it used to take seven days, but after the implementation of e-governance it took only five hours to clear forty petitions. I hope one can see such systems in many more state and central government offices.

In his own time, in his own place, in what he really is, and in the stage he has reached—good or bad—every human being is a specific element within the whole of the manifest divine Being. So why be afraid of difficulties, sufferings and problems? When troubles come, try to understand the relevance of your sufferings. Adversity always presents opportunities for introspection.

A.T.: I understand that you had a lot of difficulty in arranging relief of about 700,000 for each family? A.P.J.: I have forgotten that. There is a point at which everything becomes simple and there is no longer any question of choice, because all you have staked will be lost if you look back. Life, all through, is marked by points of no return—that is where I stood at that time.

For instance, the education system, instead of going by textbook teaching, will promote creative and interactive self-learning—both formal and informal—with a focus on values, merit and quality. Workers, instead of being skilled or semi-skilled, will be knowledgeable, self-empowered and flexibly skilled. Types of work, instead of being structured and hardware driven, will be more flexible and software driven. Management styles will be delegative rather than directive.

When Dr Sarabhai gave shape to a vision to develop rockets in India, he was questioned, along with the political leadership, on the relevance of such a programme when a vast majority in the country was battling the demons of hunger and poverty. Yet, he was in agreement with Jawaharlal Nehru that India could only play a meaningful role in the affairs of the world if the country was self-reliant in every manner, and should be able to apply advanced technologies to alleviate real-life problems. Thus our space programme was never simply a desire to be one among an elite group of nations, neither was it a matter of playing catch-up with other countries. Rather, it was an expression of the need for developing indigenous capabilities in telecommunications, meteorology and education.

In any village or panchayat or district, we will always find at least a few corruption-free good human beings. We may even find pockets of corruption-free societies. If these can be identified and celebrated, we can create a nearly corruption-free state. The real-world examples of corruption-free individuals and groups and societies must be discussed publicly, so that they can become examples to be followed in the country. A nation can be corruption free only when its states are corruption free; a state can be corruption free only if its districts are corruption free; a district can be corruption free only if its panchayats are corruption free; a panchayat can be corruption free only if the people are corruption free; and people can be corruption free only if they have imbibed these values from their childhood.

Then the Second World War was over and India’s freedom was imminent. ‘Indians will build their own India,’ declared Gandhiji. The whole country was filled with an unprecedented optimism. I asked my father’s permission to leave Rameswaram and study at the district headquarters in Ramanathapuram. He told me as if thinking aloud, ‘Abul! I know you have to go away to grow. Does the seagull not fly across the Sun, alone and without a nest? You must forego your longing for the land of your memories to move into the dwelling place of your greater desires; our love will not bind you nor will our needs hold you.’ He quoted Khalil Gibran to my hesitant mother, ‘Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts. For they have their own thoughts.

To the memory of my parents My Mother Sea waves, golden sand, pilgrims' faith, Rameswaram Mosque Street, all merge into one, My Mother! You come to me like heaven's caring arms. I remember the war days when life was challenge and toil— Miles to walk, hours before sunrise, Walking to take lessons from the saintly teacher near the temple. Again miles to the Arab teaching school, Climb sandy hills to Railway Station Road, Collect, distribute newspapers to temple city citizens, Few hours after sunrise, going to school. Evening, business time before study at night. All this pain of a young boy, My Mother you transformed into pious strength With kneeling and bowing five times For the Grace of the Almighty only, My Mother. Your strong piety is your children's strength, You always shared your best with whoever needed the most, You always gave, and gave with faith in Him. I still remember the day when I was ten, Sleeping on your lap to the envy of my elder brothers and sisters It was full moon night, my world only you knew Mother! My Mother! When at midnight I woke with tears falling on my knee You knew the pain of your child, My Mother. Your caring hands, tenderly removing the pain Your love, your care, your faith gave me strength To face the world without fear and with His strength. We will meet again on the great Judgement Day, My Mother! APJ Abdul Kalam

The birth of TERLS, and then VSSC, gave India the capability to design, develop and produce world-class rocket systems. India developed the capability of launching geo-synchronous, sun-synchronous and meteorology spacecraft, communication satellites and remote sensing satellites, thereby providing fast communication, weather forecasting and also locating water resources for the country.

In Indian institutions, what often hinders growth is the reluctance of those at the top to listen to their juniors and subordinates. There is a belief that all decisions and ideas must come in a top-to-down manner.

mistakes and failures are a part of every project, particularly in ones like ours where we work on a number of systems and various teams are responsible for different stages, where even a small error at one stage can put to waste years of hard work. Dr Sarabhai used these mistakes as gateways for innovation and the development of new systems. He had the ability to look beyond the specific error and read what lay behind it. He kept room for errors and instead tried to analyse how we could make them manageable, so that we ruled the project, and not our fear of failure.

It is perhaps a pattern in my life that those closest to me pass away suddenly, without warning. What has that taught me? For each person I lost I found a new layer of grief to cover myself with, and each time I tried to bring something of their essence into my own being—be it unconditional love, kindness and piety. In Dr Sarabhai’s case, perhaps it was the ability to look ahead—to plan, to build and to create. If I have achieved even a part of that through my actions and through the various roles I have been entrusted with, I consider myself successful in living up to the expectations of this great visionary of India.

Now, this is where the key to the modern world order lies—superiority through technology. Deprive the opponent of the latest technology and then dictate your terms in an unequal contest. When the Chinese philosopher, Sun Tzu, ruminated over 2,000 years ago that what matters in war is not decimating the enemy army physically but breaking his will so as to make him concede defeat in the mind, he seems to have visualized the domination of technology in the twentieth-century theatres of war.

Today, all over the developed world, the time gap between each of the steps in this cycle has been shortened. In India, we are just progressing towards that stage—closing the loop.

The biggest problem the Indian youth faced, I felt, was a lack of clarity of vision, a lack of direction. It was then that I decided to write about the circumstances and people who made me what I am today; the idea was not merely to pay tribute to some individuals or highlight certain aspects of my life. What I wanted to say was that no one, however poor, underprivileged or small, need feel disheartened about life. Problems are a part of life. Suffering is the essence of success.

some poor child living in an obscure place, in an underprivileged social setting, may find a little solace in the way my destiny has been shaped. It could perhaps help such children liberate themselves from the bondage of their illusory backwardness and hopelessness.

Existential issues tend to arise naturally in life, especially during transitions and intense events. They can, however, be brought forth through inner work.

Books can be sources of inspiration for anyone, anywhere. In 2011, I went to Madurai to inaugurate the Paediatric Oncology unit of the Meenakshi Mission Hospital. After the programme, a person who looked very familiar approached me. When he came closer, I realized that he has been my driver when I was working with DRDL in Hyderabad. His name is V. Kathiresan, and he worked with me day and night for nine years. During that time, I had noticed that he was always reading in his spare time, be it a book, magazine or a newspaper. That dedication attracted me. One day, I asked him what made him read so much during his leisure time. He replied that he had a son and daughter and both asked him lots of questions. In order to give them correct answers, he read and studied whenever he got the time. The spirit of learning in him impressed me and I told him to study formally through a distance education course. I also gave him some free time to attend the course and complete his +2 and then to apply for higher education. He took that as a challenge and kept on studying. He did B.A. (History), then M.A. (History) and then he did M.A. (Political Science). He also completed his B.Ed and then M.Ed. Then he registered for his Ph.D in Manonmaniam Sundaranar University and got his Ph.D in 2001. He joined the education department of Tamil Nadu government and served for a number of years. In 2011, when I met him, he was an assistant professor in the Government Arts College at Mellur near Madurai. What extraordinary commitment and dedication had helped him to acquire the right skills in his leisure time and changed the course of his life.

I told them to take this oath: Today onwards, I will start a home library with twenty books, and out of which ten books will be children’s books. My daughter and son will enlarge this home library with 200 books. My grandchildren will build a great home library of 2,000 books. I consider our library a lifelong treasure and the precious property of our family. We will spend at least one hour at the library to study along with our family members.

One of the first things I did at Rashtrapati Bhavan was to initiate e-governance.

We conducted research on the competencies and development requirements of each state. The required information was collected from the Planning Commission, government departments—both central and state—national and international assessments of the state and other relevant documents. The data was analysed and put in a presentable form using graphics and multimedia. At the meetings, PowerPoint presentations were made to the MPs with an emphasis on three areas: 1) the vision for a developed India; 2) the heritage of the particular states or union territory; and 3) their core competencies. The objective was to stress the point that to achieve the development of the nation, it was vital to achieve the development of each of these areas. Hence a fourth aspect was also prepared—selected development indicators for each of them. And what an enrichment I got by way of preparation and by the contributions of the members of Parliament, who hailed from all parties. Meeting them helped me to understand the richness of the diverse parts of the country.

Today I address professionals, business leaders and researchers on how they can contribute with innovative ideas to achieve these ten pillars. These are as follows: 1) A nation where the rural and urban divide has reduced to a thin line. 2) A nation where there is equitable distribution and adequate access to energy and quality water. 3) A nation where agriculture, industry and the service sector work together in symphony. 4) A nation where education with value systems is not denied to any meritorious candidates because of societal or economic discrimination. 5) A nation which is the best destination for the most talented scholars, scientists and investors. 6) A nation where the best of healthcare is available to all. 7) A nation where the governance is responsive, transparent and corruption free. 8) A nation where poverty has been totally eradicated, illiteracy removed and crimes against women and children are absent and no one in the society feels alienated. 9) A nation that is prosperous, healthy, secure, peaceful and happy and follows a sustainable growth path. 10) A nation that is one of the best places to live in and is proud of its leadership.

Many challenges need to be responded to: the emergence of multiparty coalitions as a regular form of government that need to rapidly evolve as a stable, two-party system;

I analysed the causes of delay in delivering justice, which are: 1) an inadequate number of courts; 2) an inadequate number of judicial officers; 3) the judicial officers are not fully equipped to tackle cases involving specialized knowledge; 4) the dilatory tactics followed by the litigants and their lawyers who seek frequent adjournments and delays in filing documents; and 5) the role of the administrative staff of the court. Based on my analysis, I suggested encouraging dispute resolution through the human touch; reinforcing the Lok Adalats; creating a National Litigation Pendency Clearance Mission; ensuring alternative dispute redressal mechanisms such as arbitration; and providing fast-track courts. I also suggested several actions with particular reference to pendency in the high courts. These included the classification of cases on the basis of an age analysis, that is, identifying cases that are redundant because the subsequent generations are not interested in pursuing them. Primary among my recommendations was the e-judiciary initiative. As part of this, I recommended computerization of the active case files, taking into account the age analysis, which will surely reduce the number of cases that are still pending.

Finally, I gave the following nine suggestions which will enable our judicial system to administer timely justice to our citizens. 1) Judges and members of the bar should consider how to limit the number of adjournments being sought. 2) E-judiciary must be implemented in our courts. 3) Cases should be classified and grouped according to their facts and relevant laws. 4) Experts in specialized branches of law such as military law, service matters, taxation and cyber law should be appointed as judges. 5) The quality of legal education in all our universities should be improved on the pattern of law schools. 6) An exemplary penalty should be imposed on those seeking undue adjournments and initiating frivolous litigation. 7) Judges of high courts and district courts may follow the suggested model for the Supreme Court and enhance the number of cases decided by them by voluntarily working extra hours on working days and Saturdays. 8) ‘Multi sessions in courts’ should be instituted, with staggered timings, to enhance capacity utilization with additional manpower and an empowered management structure. 9) A National Litigation Pendency Clearance Mission should be created for a two-year operation for time-bound clearance of pending cases.

it is essential for the nation to implement the e-governance process fast. While doing this, we must also have a quantitative measure of the impact of e-governance on our society. Every year, we must be able to measure the number of people who have been touched by the benefits of e-governance.

The passing of the Right to Education Act 2009, the Right to Information Act 2005, and the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 are some examples of the effective functioning of the legislative system.

Some of the key accomplishments of the executive system have been the time-bound realization of the metro railway system in Delhi; the successful, though partial, implementation of e-governance models in certain states, bringing about substantial transparency in the system; a working model of the railway reservation system; the virtual university initiatives of the three 150-year-old universities of the country, namely Madras, Calcutta and Mumbai; and the healthcare services provided through the Yeshaswini scheme. Innovative monitoring systems for electrical energy generation and distribution, leading to the reduction of losses and pilferage, have made a few state electricity boards profitable institutions.

The judgements of the Supreme Court and some high courts are now available on the Internet. This step has considerably relieved the agony of the litigants and also enables others to use these judgements in their areas of interest. This is a giant step towards transparency. It is essential that all other courts in the country also follow this model. They need to be facilitated by the law ministry, the state governments and the higher judiciary in these endeavours. In addition to this, landmark directions from the Supreme Court on the use of CNG, and the interlinking of rivers will also have a large impact on the welfare of the society.

Dr Nanaji Deshmukh. He was instrumental in making eighty villages ‘litigation free’ through the DRI (Deendayal Research Institute). This was a successful experiment for resolving disputes within families and within villages.

it is possible to create a corruption-free society by enlisting good human beings, and spreading the message of their success.

One of our nation’s biggest challenges is the upliftment of the 270 million people who are below the poverty line. They need housing, food, healthcare, and they need education and employment, which will enable them to lead a good life. Our GDP is oscillating between 4-6 per cent per annum, whereas economists suggest that to uplift the people living below the poverty line, our economy has to grow at the rate of 10 per cent per annum consistently for over a decade.

There are five areas where India has core competencies for integrated action: (1) Agriculture and food processing (2) Reliable and quality electric power, surface transport and infrastructure for all parts of the country (3) Education and healthcare (4) Information and communication technology (5) Strategic sectors

No country has so far implemented an e-governance system for over one billion people. Therefore, it is a big challenge for us.

As an example of the use of technology in the democratic process, I visualize an election scenario where a candidate files his nomination from a particular constituency. Immediately, the election officer verifies the authenticity from the national citizen ID database through a multipurpose citizen ID card. The candidate’s civic consciousness and citizenship behaviour can also be accessed through the police crime records. The property records come from land registration authorities across the country. Income and wealth resources come from the income tax department, as well as other sources. The person’s education credentials come from his university records. The track record of employment comes from various employers with whom he has worked. The credit history comes from various credit institutions like banks. The person’s legal track records come from the judicial system. All the details arrive at the computer terminal of the election officer within a few minutes through the e-governance software, which would track various state and central government web services directories through the network and collect the information quickly and automatically and present facts in real-time without any bias. An artificial intelligence software would analyse the candidate’s credentials and give a rating on how successful that person would be as a politician. The election officer can then make an informed choice and start the electoral processes.

Let not thy winged days be spent in vain. When once gone, no gold can buy them back.’ It meant that the best days of our lives were now, when we were learning, and we had to make the most of this time. Once gone, the time would run like sand between our fingers and we would never get it back again. The words filled me with hope and expectations and also helped me put aside my homesickness and look forward to all that I would learn at this new school.

Whenever human beings find themselves alone, as a natural reaction, they start looking for company.

In the humble environs of my boyhood, books were a scarce commodity. By local standards, however, the personal library of STR Manickam, a former ‘revolutionary’ or militant nationalist, was sizeable. He encouraged me to read all I could and I often visited his home to borrow books.

Every child is born, with some inherited characteristics, into a specific socio-economic and emotional environment, and trained in certain ways by figures of authority. I inherited honesty and self-discipline from my father; from my mother, I inherited faith in goodness and deep kindness and so did my three brothers and sister. But it was the time I spent with Jallaluddin and Samsuddin that perhaps contributed most to the uniqueness of my childhood and made all the difference in my later life. The unschooled wisdom of Jallaluddin and Samsuddin was so intuitive and responsive to non-verbal messages that I can unhesitatingly attribute my subsequently manifested creativity to their company in my childhood.

my science teacher Sivasubramania Iyer, though an orthodox Brahmin with a very conservative wife, was something of a rebel. He did his best to break social barriers so that people from varying backgrounds could mingle easily. He used to spend hours with me and would say, ‘Kalam, I want you to develop so that you are on par with the highly educated people of the big cities.’ One day, he invited me to his home for a meal. His wife was horrified at the idea of a Muslim boy being invited to dine in her ritually pure kitchen. She refused to serve me in her kitchen. Sivasubramania Iyer was not perturbed, nor did he get angry with his wife, but instead, served me with his own hands and sat down beside me to eat his meal. His wife watched us from behind the kitchen door. I wondered whether she had observed any difference in the way I ate rice, drank water or cleaned the floor after the meal. When I was leaving his house, Sivasubramania Iyer invited me to join him for dinner again the next weekend. Observing my hesitation, he told me not to get upset, saying, ‘Once you decide to change the system, such problems have to be confronted.’ When I visited his house the next week, Sivasubramania Iyer’s wife took me inside her kitchen and served me food with her own hands.

Jallaluddin used to speak to me about the power of positive thinking and I often recalled his words when I felt homesick or dejected. I tried hard to do as he said, which was to strive to control my thoughts and my mind and, through these, to influence my destiny.

Anyone who has taken up the responsibility to lead a team can be successful only if he is sufficiently independent, powerful and influential in his own right to become a person to reckon with. This is perhaps also the path to individual satisfaction in life, for freedom with responsibility is the only sound basis for personal happiness. What can one do to strengthen personal freedom?... First, by building your own education and skills. Knowledge is a tangible asset…The second way is to develop a passion for personal responsibility.

The many people he met, along with his lifelong interest in teaching, made him often consider the legacy one generation leaves behind for another.

He was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 1981 and around that time was asked to take charge of the Guided Missile Development Programme at the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) by Dr Raja Ramanna. Here he went on to develop India’s missile programme with the missile systems Prithvi, Trishul, Nag, Akash and Agni taking shape at this time.

Anyone who has taken up the responsibility to lead a team can be successful only if he is sufficiently independent, powerful and influential in his own right to become a person to reckon with. This is perhaps also the path to individual satisfaction in life, for freedom with responsibility is the only sound basis for personal happiness. What can one do to strengthen personal freedom?... First, by building your own education and skills. Knowledge is a tangible asset…The second way is to develop a passion for personal responsibility

In 1991, while looking forward to his retirement and planning to open a school for underprivileged children, he started writing down his memoirs. He had always written poetry and was an avid reader from his days as a student in Madras. The book he wrote began with his childhood days and ended somewhere after the launch of Agni. Called Wings of Fire,

In 1992, he took over as the Scientific Advisor to the Minister of Defence and secretary, Department of Research and Development, and continued till he was seventy. The country’s highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, was conferred on him in 1997. A year later, in 1998, he led the team that conducted India’s second nuclear tests in Pokhran. Five nuclear tests were conducted consecutively and India became a nuclear power. In 1999, he was appointed principal scientific advisor to the government of India with the rank of a Cabinet minister. By 2001, he was enjoying a teacher’s life at Anna University in Chennai. Meant to lecture a class of sixty, most of his lectures ended up in an overflowing hall with about 200 students instead. In 2002, he was elected the eleventh President of India.

he moved beyond the stately confines of the Rashtrapati Bhawan and travelled the length and breadth of the country, meeting students, politicians, teachers, bureaucrats, professionals from all fields, talking to them, answering their queries patiently and filling every gathering with inspiration and pride. He talked of his humble beginnings, of working with the best minds of the country in his years at ISRO and DRDO, and laid out specific programmes to bring about prosperity and connectivity to every corner of the country.

Till date, he has written twenty-eight books that range from the autobiographical to the inspirational and the spiritual.

Hard work and piety, study and learning, compassion and forgiveness—these have been the cornerstones of my life. I have now shared with the world the roots of these features. In fact, any life that has been lived to the full, when talked about with others, is a treasure house of thoughts and feelings that add lustre to the wonder that is life. In the process, if they also give my readers wings and help them to fire their dreams, I believe I would have played my small part in the scheme of life that destiny placed me in.

I was swimming in the sea, Waves came one after the other I was swimming and swimming to reach my destination. But one wave, a powerful wave, overpowered me; It took me along in its own direction, I was pulled long and along. When I was about to lose amidst the sea wave power, One thought flashed to me—yes, that is courage Courage to reach my goal, courage to defeat the powerful force and succeed; With courage in my mind, indomitable spirit engulfed me, With indomitable spirit in mind and action, I regained lost confidence I can win, win and win Strength came back to me, overpowered the sea wave I reached the destination, my mission.

It was also the first glimmer of a thought that has shaped me since: that it must always be our inner convictions and strength of beliefs that dictate our actions. External forces, temptations and counsels will always be dinned into us, but those among us who can stand up to what we innately believe to be good and right will finally be at peace with ourselves. Our country needs citizens who trust their individuality, who cannot be manipulated by people with unscrupulous agendas.

Kisan Call Centres provide valuable and timely knowledge support to farmers and fishermen. Similar domain service provider call centres are required in the field of commerce and industry, entrepreneurial skill development and employment generation, travel and tourism, banking and insurance, meteorological forecasting, disaster warning systems, education and human resource development and healthcare.

A corruption-free society is not merely a dream, it is entirely achievable.

the elected leader of the nation should be a creative leader, who walks the path of pursuing developmental politics, adopting cooperation and collaboration as the key to operational procedure and using the core competence of all parties—irrespective of party affiliations—as well as other able and creative minds from any discipline to realize the vision of an economically developed nation.

Indian economy can withstand the world financial crisis better. This is due to: The liberalization process in India has checks and balances consistent with the unique social requirements of the country. The Indian banking system has always been conservative, which has prevented a crisis similar to that in the US and in Europe. The Indian psyche is generally savings-oriented and living within one’s means is a part of the Indian mindset. The 400-million-strong middle class, with its purchasing power, is providing economic stability to the nation.

but we are still vulnerable to the vagaries of the global economic turbulence because of an excess of imports and reduced exports, leading to trade deficit, increased current account deficit—which leads to inflation—and the depreciation of the rupee to 60.49 per US dollar in June 2013.

Why does this happen even though India has a good economic foundation? It is because we have an economic system which is vulnerable to the fluctuations of the world economy and our economic growth is not sustainable, as witnessed from the 5 per cent GDP growth in the 1990s to 9 per cent for around four years till 2009 and, finally, the present 5.5 per cent. This is mainly due to our prevailing economic policies which are stifling the growth of agriculture and food processing, the manufacturing sector and the service sector. If we bring a marked change in our socio-political and economic policies with a focus on inclusiveness, then I am confident that we as a nation will be able to overcome the economic crisis and progress to new heights.

Power generation through renewable energy has to be increased from 5 per cent to 28 per cent. Dependence on fossil fuels as primary energy source needs to be brought under 50 per cent from the present 75 per cent. Mandating the use of ethanol from 10 per cent to 20 per cent and the associated public policy for ethanol development by the sugarcane industry is also required. There is also a need for a sustainable biofuel policy for generating 60 million tonnes of biofuel, along with the use of alternate sources such as emulsification, bio-algae and hydrogen fuel.

We also need to increase the forest cover from 20 per cent to 40 per cent by 2020 as well as enrich the environment through mandatory zero liquid discharge and zero effluent discharge system policies for industrial waste, encourage power generation from biomass and municipal waste at city corporations and village municipalities and create 200,000 carbon-neutral village panchayats before 2020.

We need the implementation of the Smart Waterways Grid across India to harness 1,500 BCM of floodwater and connect the rivers and catchment areas as a single plane. The grid will receive 1,500 BCM of floodwater and act as a water grid so that water can be released to any deficient place and replenished during flood. It would act as a 15,000 kilometres-long national reservoir. It would be able to provide drinking water to 600 million people, irrigation to 150 million acres of land, and generate 60,000 MW of power. Due to ground water recharge, it would also save 4,000 MW of power. Each state can implement this mission with an outlay of approximately 50,000 crores with annual budgetary support, central government assistance, public-private consortia and with support from the World Bank in a BOOT (Build, Operate, Own and Transfer) based PPP model and this can be realized within 2020. Apart from this, an Integrated Water Resource Management system is also required to revive water bodies and tanks and build farm ponds and checkdams across India as well as increase irrigation infrastructure and groundwater potential, thereby enhancing the safe drinking water resources of the nation.

Removing red tapism and favoritism in higher education and research administration and management is of utmost importance. We need to empower universities, both government funded and private, to promote research and enable them to improve research infrastructure.

We need to achieve an Ease of Doing Business index to less than 50 compared to its present level of 132. (China is at 91).

Inclusive growth-oriented policies will bring equitable, inclusive growth and level socio-economic imbalances in society which will remove socio-economic and political alienation and reduce Naxalist and Maoist tendencies. Developmental politics instead of political politics will also reduce the prevalent bitter political alienation.

Members of Parliament are eligible for allocation of constituency development fund (MPLADS) of 5 crore every year.

Sunderbans is south Asia’s largest ‘carbon sink’—it mops up carbon dioxide—

We are in a good state with respect to generation of wind energy. Within the last decade, we have reached a capacity of generating over 11,000 MW through large scale wind farms. With this experience, it is possible to enhance our capacity to 45,000 MW by using low wind energy windmills by 2030.

anything could bring me down to earth and show me that sometimes the sky was not the limit, it was this rude lesson—that often there are powers greater than yours who dictate the consequences of your work. My other lesson was that while there are areas that I cannot influence, I can certainly do my work to the best and to the most of my abilities, as finally that is all that remains in one's hands.

the best way to win is to not covet the win too much, instead to keep a calm and open mind to new challenges.

The task of wealth generation for the nation has to be woven around national competencies. The Technology Information, Forecasting and Assessment Council (TIFAC) task team has identified core areas that will spearhead our march towards becoming a knowledge society. The areas are: information technology, biotechnology, space technology, weather forecasting, disaster management, tele-medicine and tele-education, technologies utilizing traditional knowledge, service sector and infotainment which is the emerging area resulting from the convergence of information and entertainment.

The knowledge society has two very important components driven by societal transformation and wealth generation. The societal transformation is with respect to education, healthcare, agriculture and governance. These will lead to employment generation, high productivity and rural prosperity.

I shared with the ninety-year-old Subramaniam his vision of a second Green Revolution. He told me about his dream of setting up a national agro foundation that would develop hybrid seeds. His foundation would adopt small and marginal farmers and provide them with laboratory facilities for soil testing and access to information on the weather and markets, so that they could earn more through enhanced yields and better prices for what they produced. He aimed at bringing a million farmers under the scheme. Visionaries don’t age!

One: Sweat for generations and the hard work of teams. Two: In Wipro we work for the customer’s delight. Three: A bit of luck. The third point will not be of any consequence if the first two aspects are not achieved.

Ignited minds are the most powerful resource on earth,

A system to prevent the soiling of railway tracks by Madhav Pathak of Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh; Herbal pesticide tablets to be used in the storage of foodgrains by Priyanka Guleria of Sionty village, Punjab; Low-calorie biscuits made from banana peels by Rucha Joshi of Nanded, Maharashtra; A toy laser with educational applications by Sudhanwa Hukkeri of Belgaum, Karnataka; A software program for embedding text through audio signals by Kyan Pardiwalla of Mumbai, Maharashtra; An optically controlled wheelchair by S. Harish Chandra of Chennai, Tamil Nadu.

The capacities teachers need to build among students in order to equip them to become nation builders are: The capacity for research or inquiry; Capacity for creativity and innovation, particularly the creative transfer of knowledge; Capacity to use high technology; Capacity for entrepreneurial leadership; Capacity for moral leadership.

if something is at stake, the human mind gets ignited and its working capacity gets enhanced manifold. That’s exactly what happened. This is one of the techniques of building talent. The message is that the young in the organization, whatever be their specialization, must be trained in such a way that they are prepared for new products, innovation and for undertaking higher organizational responsibilities.

The vision for India’s Green Revolution was formed in the 1970s under the leadership of C. Subramaniam. With his visionary leadership, and with the scientific leadership of Nobel Laureate Dr Norman Borlaugh and Dr M.S. Swaminathan, and the active support of B. Sivaraman, Secretary Agriculture, in partnership with agricultural scientists and farmers,