The Resurgent Spirit of India: A Call to Youth for National Greatness

“Never lose your faith in the destiny of India” - Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose

What Netaji said many years ago in a completely different time and circumstances is applicable even today. 

India is the oldest civilisation and has survived even to this day. All other civilisations except for the Chinese have been wiped out. In the ancient times, the major civilisations sprung up due to the presence of the rivers. Egyptian civilisation sprung up on the banks of the Nile river. However, the civilisation in India sprung up on the back of seven rivers which is why the landmass of India is often known as the Sapt Sindhu. 

During the ancient era, India was known as a golden bird because of its wealth. It used to be one-third to one-fourth of the world GDP. It was but natural for foreign invaders to try to get their hands on the wealth of India. However, the solid defence of India held up against such invaders. Even Alexander was fought to a standstill by Porus who ruled only a small province in modern day Pakistan. 

However, the greatness of India fell along with the multiple invasions that battered India starting with the famous invasion of Bakhtiyar Khilji who destroyed Nalanda University, one of the oldest and biggest universities in the entire world. 

The reason I spoke about the greatness of our civilisation is to emphasise how it should be our foremost duty to regain that greatness. 

Ever since foreign occupation, India has been losing its position in terms of greatness for the past 500 years. What used to be a nation holding 25%-30% of the world GDP reached as low as 3% of the world GDP in 1950 despite being one of the largest countries in terms of population. Even when we look back a couple of decades, India used to be a country which few people used to refer to as one which is to be taken seriously. 

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However, now India is considered as a force to be reckoned with. It is the most dominant power in the Indian Ocean region. It has the second largest army in the world (second only to China and ahead of the United States). The Indian economy is currently the fifth largest in the world in terms of nominal GDP and is also the fastest growing major economy. In a couple of years it is expected to outstrip Germany and Japan to become the third largest economy. When we look in terms of PPP, India is already the third largest economy. Even the future holds rich prospects for India as it is expected to be the only major economy not projected to have a recession for the next couple of decades. 

Today, all the major powers - Russia and the United States - are working hard towards maintaining friendship with India because they understand that India is the only nation which can provide an effective counter to the China threat. India’s foreign relations has also never been better with good ties with both Israel and the other middle eastern countries. 

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Today India is also reasserting its presence culturally with focus on disseminating the greatness of yoga, rebuilding the Ram temple, etc. Destroying the colonial legacy and celebrating our heroes like Shivaji Maharaj, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and felicitating them for their greatness and for their true contributions. 

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My point through this discourse is that India is making a comeback. However, the task is far from complete. This is just the beginning. We need to make further leaps in becoming the largest economy in the world, becoming militarily powerful, and spreading our culture all over the world. The task most definitely falls on us, the youth. We are the ones who will be carrying the nation on our shoulders on the path of greatness. Even minor contributions from each one of us can change a lot. One of the best things to have happened is the change in the attitude of Indians. 

Our parents’ and grandparents’ generation used to be embarrassed of identifying themselves as Indians outside our country. They were not unjustified given India’s position across all aspects. However, ever since liberalisation and the IT boom and India earning a space in the global IT industry, the attitude has seen a shift. Today the change is taking place towards one where we are proud of not only our nationality, but also of our culture. This also has to translate in the work that we do. As Sanjeev Sanyal famously stated, certain regions, specially Bengal, had been suffering from the problem of poverty of aspiration. We must make sure not to fall into such a trap as there is little rescue out of such a situation and ultimately leads to the hell hole situations Bengal and Bihar are experiencing today. 

Our youth must be hungry for more and be willing to set our own standards. One of the interesting facts to be noted is that India is consistently ranked lower than countries like Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc in indicators like press freedom index, democracy index. I have only point to make in response to this. India is a democracy which has survived for 77 long years. Inspite of multiple political assassinations and civil unrest, elections have been conducted regularly inspite of huge cultural differences, whereas our neighbour has succumbed to military dictatorship inspite of having greater cultural homogeneity. 

I am making it a point to assert that Indians know how to live harmoniously despite the occasional small fights. It is ingrained in our culture and this has been one of the greatest teachings from our history and our motherland. Never forget that in the ancient era India used to spread its culture all across the world. When we go to countries like China, Japan and the Southeast Asian countries, we will see a major presence of Indian culture everywhere. 

My immediate recommendation as part of the foreign policy would be to enhance our diplomatic relations with our South-East Asian neighbours on this basis. We must not forget that Japan has been the country which helped us the most in our Independence struggle by helping the Azad Hind Fauj and the efforts of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. 

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Henceforth I give this as a call to all youth to never lose faith in the destiny of India because India is proving its grit even in this difficult time of impending economic crisis and war. There are multiple ways of serving the nation. Being great movie makers, entrepreneurs, political leaders are just some of the ways. Therefore, I urge all youth to join hands and work together to restore the greatness of our motherland to her ancient glory of civilisational greatness.

Jai Hind!