Peace and Progress

 “Peace must be our ideology, progress our horizon”

I begin by quoting the ending words of President Pranab Mukherjee’s maiden address to the nation on the eve of our sixty-fifth anniversary of Independence, last Tuesday. It was a great speech which captured the essence of the here and now situation at this point in the history of our nation.  Earlier, in his acceptance speech after taking oath of office on July 26, President Mukherjee had also spoken of peace and economic progress. Both speeches are in sync in projecting his vision and emphasis.

Unfortunately, the contents of the President’s address to the nation did not find important space in the print media. In some dailies it was relegated to the interior pages while in some important dailies it found no mention at all. Baba Ramdev’s pronouncements were highlighted more than the message of the President. This, I feel is not a proper perspective. The President is the head of state, the first citizen of our country. While the Prime Minister’s annual speech at the Red Fort may be guided by the  exigencies of immediate contexts and even political colors, the President is supposed to look at the state of affairs from an impartial platform. The Independence Day is a solemn occasion to celebrate and ponder. Politicians, civil society leaders and others speak, act and agitate  the whole year round. They say one thing today and another tomorrow. But the President addresses the nation only twice a year, on the eve of Independence Day and that of Republic Day. And what an experienced and senior First Citizen of the country says should not be sidelined by the press, though I can very well understand that the speeches of some past occupants of the Rashtrapati Bhavan may not have been inspiring.

Coming back to the theme of peace and progress, President Mukherjee struck the right chord when he said in his acceptance speech: “Peace is the first ingredient of prosperity. History has often been written in the red of blood; but development and progress are the luminous rewards of a peace dividend, not a war trophy…… But the visible rewards of peace have also obscured the fact that the age of war is not over. We are in the midst of a fourth world war; the third was the Cold War, but it was very warm in Asia, Africa and Latin America till it ended in the early 1990s. The war against terrorism is the fourth; and it is a world war because it can raise its evil head anywhere in the world. India has been on the frontlines of this war long before many other recognized its vicious depth or poisonous consequences.”

Published in The Navhind Times, Panorama 19.08.2012