Dr Kalam,tujhe salaam!!

Few excerpts from our respectable President's inspirational speech

"Why is the media here so negative?

Why are we in India so embarrassed to recognize our own strengths, our achievements? We are such a great nation. We have so many amazing success stories but we refuse to acknowledge them.

We are the first in milk production.
We are number one in Remote sensing satellites.
We are the second largest producer of wheat.
We are the second largest producer of rice.

There are millions of such achievements but our media is only obsessed in the bad news and failures and disasters. I was in Tel Aviv once and I was reading the Israeli newspaper. It was the day after a lot of attacks and bombardments and deaths had taken place. The Hamas had struck. But the front page of the newspaper had the picture of a Jewish gentleman who in five years had transformed his desert into an orchid and a granary. It was this inspiring picture that everyone woke up to. The gory details of killings,bombardments, deaths, were inside in the newspaper, buried among other news.

In India we only read about death, sickness, terrorism, crime. Why are we so NEGATIVE?"

"YOU say that our government is inefficient.
YOU say that our laws are too old.
YOU say that the municipality does not pick up the garbage.
YOU say that the phones don't work, the railways are a joke, The
Airline is the worst in the world, mails never reach their destination.
YOU say that our country has been fed to the dogs and is the absolute pits.
YOU say, say and say. What do YOU do about it?

In Singapore you don't throw cigarette butts on the roads or eat in the stores.
YOU are as proud of their Underground links as they are. You pay $5 (approx. Rs. 60) to drive through Orchard Road (equivalent of Mahim Causeway or Pedder Road) between 5 PM and 8 PM.
YOU come back to the parking lot to punch your parking ticket if you have over stayed in a restaurant or a shopping mall irrespective of your status identity. .
In Singapore you don't say anything, DO YOU?

YOU wouldn't dare to eat in public during Ramadan, in Dubai.
YOU would not dare to go out without your head covered in Jeddah.
YOU would not dare to buy an employee of the telephone exchange in London at 10 pounds (Rs. 650) a month to, "see to it that my STD and ISD calls are billed to someone else."
YOU would not dare to speed beyond 55 mph (88 km/h) in Washington and then tell the traffic cop, "Jaanta hai main kaun hoon (Do you know who I am?). I am so and so's son. Take your two bucks and get lost."
YOU wouldn't chuck an empty coconut shell anywhere other than the garbage pail on the beaches in Australia and New Zealand.

Why don't YOU spit Paan on the streets of Tokyo?
Why don't YOU use examination jockeys or buy fake certificates in
Boston??? We are still talking of the same YOU.

YOU who can respect and conform to a foreign system in other countries but cannot in your own. You who will throw papers and cigarettes on the road the moment you touch Indian ground. If you can be an involved and appreciative citizen in an alien country, why cannot you be the same here in India?"

"I am echoing J.F. Kennedy's words to his fellow Americans to relate to Indians.....

"ASK WHAT WE CAN DO FOR INDIA AND DO WHAT HAS TO BE DONE TO MAKE INDIA
WHAT AMERICA AND OTHER WESTERN COUNTRIES ARE TODAY"

Lets do what India needs from us."

I read his speech through a forwarded mail and on the same day I saw an article in the newspaper which made me respect him to such a great extent that I made sure to throw waste materials only in the dustbin even if it meant carrying the waste material all the way till a dustbin is encountered on the way.I mailed him(presidentofindia@rb.nic.in) as below after reading the article in the paper.

Respected Sir,
(After introducing myself)
I received a forward that contained your speech at Hyderabad which inspired me very much. The crux of the speech is that we should not simply criticize the shortcomings in the country and just sit back expecting somebody else to clean up everything.In this context I read the news(New Indian Express dated 26th June'04) in which you had helped a CBSE student (Akhil Gupta) of Class XII who was wrongly awarded only 13% in physics,a subject in which he had done well.Noting that this will have a bearing on the youth's future, you personally took up the matter with the concerned officials and his marks were corrected to 85. This small incident proves that you are not a man of mere words but "A MAN OF ACTION".Sir,I am very much influenced by you and will follow your example in my future life.
Thanking you.

Well, hope to see our President's dream come true soon!!