Underlining the importance for unity, Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his Independence day speech said people have to celebrate the diversity of a big country like India as the country’s many faiths and traditions are its pride.
Addressing the country from the ramparts of Red fort, Prime Minister said gender equality is the first condition for unity, he said, adding that women are now doing very well in different sectors, including science and people’s representation.
“Our nation has proved that we have an inherent strength from our diversity and the common thread of patriotism makes India unshakeable,” Modi said, as he termed India the “mother of democracy”.
As against the opposition charge of eight years of the Modi-government “weakening” country’s federalism, Modi underlined his faith in cooperative federalism and the spirit of “team India”, saying this is what he practised when he was Gujarat chief minister and a different party (Congress) was in power at the Centre.
“We may have different programmes and working styles but our dreams for the nation are not different,” he said in an apparent appeal to opposition parties to work together to develop the country.
“The need of the hour today is cooperative competitive federalism along with cooperative federalism. We need competition in development,” he said, adding that many states are doing good work.
Recalling freedom struggle, Prime Minister said many indulged in scare-mongering by saying India will be “ruined” and go into the “dark age” if the British left, but the country survived and kept growing due to its inherent strength, he said.
The people made efforts and proved that India has immense capacity to survive all odds even as “hundreds of years of slavery” had inflicted “deep wounds” on it, he added.
The prime minister said India’s growth story continued despite terrorism and proxy wars, natural calamities and even as success and failures and hopes and disappointments kept showing up.
The Prime Minister pointed out a tendency to undermine freedom fighters who were not highlighted for several decades and recalled tribal leaders who sacrificed their lives for the country.
“When we talk about the freedom struggle, we cannot forget to take pride of our tribal society living in forests. There are countless names like Bhagwan Birsa Munda, Sidhu-Kanhu, Alluri Sitarama Raju, Govind Guru, who became the voice of freedom movement and inspired my tribal brothers and sisters, mothers and youth in the remotest jungles to live and die for the motherland. It has been the good fortune of the country that there have been many aspects of the freedom struggle’, Modi said.