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Even Today To Be Civilised Is Held To Be Synonymous With Being Westernised. Advanced Countries Devote Large Resources To Formulating And Spreading Ideas And Doctrines And They Tend To Impose On The Developing Nations Their Own Norms And Methods. The Pattern Of The Classical Acquisitive Society With Its Deliberate Multiplication Of Wants Not Only Is Unsuited To Conditions In Our Countries But Is Positively Harmful.

-Indira Gandhi

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Even Today To Be

Indira Gandhi

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Even Today To Be Civilised Is Held To Be Synonymous With Being Westernised. Advanced Countries Devote Large Resources To Formulating And Spreading Ideas And Doctrines And They Tend To Impose On The Developing Nations Their Own Norms And Methods. The Pattern Of The Classical Acquisitive Society With Its Deliberate Multiplication Of Wants Not Only Is Unsuited To Conditions In Our Countries But Is Positively Harmful.

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Have A Bias Toward Action - Let's See Something Happen Now. You Can Break That Big Plan Into Small Steps And Take The First Step Right Away.

[my Mother] Was The Oldest Of Two Sisters And Two Brothers, And She Grew Up With Her Brothers, Who Were About Her Age. She Grew Up, To The Age Of Ten, Like A Wild Colt, And Then All Of A Sudden That Was Over. They Had Forced On Her Her 'woman's Destiny' By Saying, 'this Isn't Done, This Isn't Good, This Isn't Worthy Of A Lady.'

One Day In 1965 Rajiv Wrote Me From London, Where He Was Studying, And Informed Me, 'you're Always Asking Me About Girls, Whether I Have A Special Girl, And So Forth. Well, I've Met A Special Girl.' And When Rajiv Returned To India, I Asked Him, 'do You Still Think About Her In The Same Way?' And He Said Yes. But She Couldn't Get Married Until She Was Twenty-one, And Until She Was Sure She'd Like To Live In India. Sonia Is Almost Completely An Indian By Now, Even Though She Doesn't Always Wear Saris.

How Is It Possible For People In The Modern World To Go On Killing Each Other For Religion? The Problems We Should Be Concerned With Nowadays Are Quite Different!

What We Do Now, On The Other Hand...don't Think That I'm Crazy About This Kind Of Politics. It's No Accident That I've Done Everything To Keep My Sons Out Of It, And So Far I've Succeeded. After Independence I Retired Immediately From Politics.

I Have Certain Objectives. They're The Same Objectives My Father Had To Give People A Higher Standard Of Living, To Do Away With The Cancer Of Poverty, To Eliminate The Consequences Of Economic Backwardness.

I Had Many Dolls. And You Know How I Played With Them? By Performing Insurrections, Assemblies, Scenes Of Arrest. My Dolls Were Almost Never Babies To Be Nursed But Men And Women Who Attacked Barracks And Ended Up In Prison.

Not Only Negroes And Jews, But Also Women Are Part Of A Great Revolt Of Which One Can Only Approve.

Difficulties Can't Be Eliminated From Life. Individuals Will Always Have Them, Countries Will Always Have Them...the Only Thing Is To Accept Them, If Possible Overcome Them, Otherwise To Come To Terms With Them. It's All Right To Fight, Yes, But Only When It's Possible.

My Father Cared Very Much About Courage, Physical Courage As Well. He Despised Those Who Didn't Have It. But He Never Said To Me, 'i Want You To Be Courageous.' He Just Smiled With Pride Every Time I Did Something Difficult Or Won A Race With The Boys.

Peace We Want Because There Is Another War To Fight Against Poverty, Disease And Ignorance.

Not Only My Parents But The Whole Family Was Involved In The Resistance - My Grandfather And Grandmother, My Uncles And Aunts, My Cousings Of Both Sexes. So Ever So Often The Police Came And Took Them Away, Indiscriminately. Well, The Fact That They Arrested Both My Father And Mother, Both My Grandfather And Grandmother, Both An Uncle And An Aunt, Made Me Accustomed To Looking On Men And Women With The Same Eyes, On An Absolute Plane Of Equality.

Even I, When I Was A Student In London, Often Wore Western Clothes, And Yet I'm The Most Indian Indian I Know.

I Know You Were Surprised When, After The Fall Of Dacca, Pakistani And Indian Officers Shook Hands. But Do You Realize That, Up Until 1965, In Our Army And The Pakistani One You Could Come Across Generals Who Were Brothers? Blood Brothers, Sons Of The Same Father And The Same Mother.

The Longer One Doesn't Write, The More Difficult It Is To Communicate.

For Me It's Absolutely The Same - I Treat One And The Other In Exactly The Same Way. As Persons, That Is, Not As Men And Women. But, Even Here, You Have To Consider The Fact That I've Had A Very Special Education, That I'm The Daughter Of A Man Like My Father And A Woman Like My Mother.

Have You Ever Climbed A Mountain? You See, Once You Arrive At The Top Of A Mountain, You Think You've Reached The Highest Point. But It's Only An Impression That Doesn't Last Long.

Until I Was About Eighteen, Yes [i Didn't Want To Get Married]. But Not Because I Felt Like A Suffragette, But Because I Wanted To Devote All My Energies To The Struggle To Free India. Marriage, I Thought, Would Have Distracted Me From The Duties I'd Imposed On Myself.

You Cannot Shake Hands With A Clenched Fist.

My Sons...i Was Crazy About My Sons And I Think I've Done A Super Job In Bringing Them Up.

The Future Doesn't Frighten Me, Even If It Threatens To Be Full Of Other Difficulties.

I Like To Think I've Provided This Faith. I Also Think That By Providing Faith, I've Focused Their Pride. I Say Focused Because Pride Isn't Something You Give. It Doesn't Even Break Out Suddenly; It's A Feeling That Grows Very Slowly, Very Confusedly.

I Was A Perfect Housewife. Being A Mother Has Always Been The Job I Liked Best. Absolutely.

Finally We Promised To Limit The Birth Rate. And This You Really Didn't Believe; You Smiled Scornfully. Well, Even In This Things Have Gone Well. The Fact Is That We Have Grown By Over Seventy Millions In Ten Years, But It's Also True That We Have Grown Less Than Many Other Countries, Including The Countries Of Europe.

I Learned Very Soon To Get Along By Myself.

It's Not Right To Say That My Father Influenced Me More Than Others, And I Wouldn't Be Able To Say Whether My Personality Was Formed More By My Father Or My Mother Or The Mahatma [gandhi] Or The Friends Who Were With Us.

A Nation' S Strength Ultimately Consists In What It Can Do On Its Own, And Not In What It Can Borrow From Others.

It Is Legitimate To Have One's Own Point Of View And Political Philosophy. But There Are People Who Make Anger, Rather Than A Deeply Held Belief, The Basis Of Their Actions. They Do Not Seem To Mind Harming Society As A Whole In The Pursuit Of Their Immediate Objective. No Society Can Survive If It Yields To The Demands Of Frenzy, Whether Of The Few Or The Many.

I Don't At All Care Who's On The Right Or Left Or In The Center. Even Though We Use Them, Even Though I Use Them Myself, These Expressions Have Lost All Meaning.

I Don't See The World As Something Divided Between Right And Left.

Still, In International Matters, The Treaty Changes Nothing. That Is, It Doesn't Prevent Us From Being Friends With Other Countries, Which Indeed We Are.

The Struggle For Independence Here Has Been Conducted In Equal Measure By Men And By Women. And When We Got Our Independence, No One Forgot That. In The Western World, On The Other Hand, Nothing Of The Kind Has Ever Happened - Women Have Participated, Yes, But Revolutions Have Always Been Made By Men Alone.

You Must Also Understand Us - Always Undervalued, Underestimated, Not Believed. Even When We Believed, You Didn't Believe Us. You Said, 'how Is It Possible To Fight Without Violence?' But Without Violence We Obtained Freedom.

Women Sometimes Go Too Far, It's True. But It's Only When You Go Too Far That Others Listen.

Naturally, If The Americans Had Fired A Shot, If The Seventh Fleet Had Done Something More Than Sit There In The Bay Of Bengal...yes, The Third World War Would Have Exploded. But, In All Honesty, Not Even That Fear Occurred To Me.

It Has Been My Experience That People Who Are At Cross-purposes With Nature Are Cynical About Mankind And Ill At Ease With Themselves.

I'm Trained To Difficulties; Difficulties Can't Be Eliminated From Life.

The Doctors Shrugged Their Shoulders And Grumbled That Perhaps If I Were To Put On Weight That Would Protect Me A Little - Being So Thin, I Would Never Succeed In Remaining Pregnant.

They're The Problems Of Poverty, Of The Rights Of The Individual, Of The Changes Brought About By Technology. They're The Ones That Count, More Than Religion!

If We Offer Something To Bangladesh, It's Obvious That Bangladesh Is Offering Something To Us. And Why Shouldn't Bangladesh Be Able To Keep Its Promises? Economically It's Full Of Resources And Can Stand On Its Feet. Politically It Seems To Me Led By Trained People. The Refugees Who Took Shelter Here Are Going Home.

My Children Needed Me, And I Like My Job As A Social Worker.

Happiness Is Such A Fleeting Point Of View - There's No Such Thing As Continual Happiness.

There Exists No Politician In India Daring Enough To Attempt To Explain To The Masses That Cows Can Be Eaten.

At No Point, At A Very Important Point: That Of Having Convinced The Indians That They Can Do Things.

You Said, 'planning Is Something For Communist Countries; Democracy And Planning Don't Go Together!' But, With All The Errors We Committed, Our Plans Succeeded.

Politics Is The Art Of Acquiring, Holding, And Wielding Power.

You Said, 'how Is It Possible For Democracy To Work With An Illiterate People Who Are Dying Of Hunger?' But With That People We Made A Democracy Work.

Dacca Is Now The Free Capital Of A Free Country.

I Said That My Father Was Not A Politician. I, Instead, Think I Am. But Not In The Sense Of Being Interested In A Political Career - Rather In The Sense That I Think It Necessary To Strive To Build A Certain India, The India I Want.

People Who Say It Was Her Father Who Prepared Her For The Post Of Prime Minister, It Was Her Father Who Launched Her, Are Wrong.

I'm Not Ambitious. Not A Bit.

The Civil Servant Is Primarily The Master Of The Short-term Solution.

It's The Same Story As When We Nationalized The Banks. I'm Not For Nationalization Because Of The Rhetoric Of Nationalization, Or Because I See In Nationalization The Cure-all For Every Injustice. I'm For Nationalization In Cases Where It's Necessary.

We Couldn't Keep Ten Million Refugees On Our Soil; We Couldn't Tolerate Such An Unstable Situation For Who Knows How Long. That Influx Of Refugees Wouldn't Have Stopped - On The Contrary. It Would Have Gone On And On And On, Until There Would Have Been An Explosion. We Were No Longer Able To Control The Arrival Of Those People, In Our Own Interest We Had To Stop It! That's What I Said To Mr.[richard] Nixon, To All The Other Leaders I Visited In An Attempt To Avert The War.

I See Nothing Wrong In Sterilizing A Man Who Has Already Brought Eight Or Ten Children Into The World. Especially If It Helps Those Eight Or Ten Children To Live Better.

The Greatest Of All Contraceptives Is Affluence.

We Were To Equally Strong Types [with My Husband], Equally Pigheaded - Neither Of Us Wanted To Give In. And...i Like To Think Those Quarrels Made Us Better, That They Enlivened Our Life, Because Without Them We Would Have Had A Normal Life, Yes, But Banal And Boring.

Nothing That Is Worthwhile Is Ever Easy.

Message In A Bottle

My Husband Lived In Lucknow. My Father Lived In Delhi, Of Course. So I Shuttled Between Delhi And Lucknow And...naturally, If My Husband Needed Me On Days When I Was In Delhi, I Ran Back To Lucknow. But If It Was My Father Who Needed Me, On The Days When I Was In Lucknow. And...yes, My Husband Got Angry. And He Quarreled. We Quarreled. We Quarreled A Lot. It's True.

Martyrdom Does Not End Something, It Only A Beginning.

The Life I've Had, The Difficulties, The Hardships, The Pain I've Suffered Since I Was A Child. It's A Great Privilege To Have Led A Difficult Life, And Many People In My Generation Have Had This Privilege - I Sometimes Wonder If Young People Today Aren't Deprived Of The Dramas That Shaped Us.

When You Govern A Country, And Especially A Country So Vast And Complex As India, You Never Arrive At Anything.

When I Was Young, I Was Very Selfish, Now Not Any More.

My Grandfather Once Told Me That There Were Two Kinds Of People: Those Who Do The Work And Those Who Take The Credit. He Told Me To Try To Be In The First Group; There Was Much Less Competition.

The International Control Commission Isn't Doing Anything, It's Never Done Anything. What Good Does It Do To Be On It Or Not? Before Opening The Embassy In Hanoi, I Gave It A Lot Of Thought, But It Wasn't Really A Painful Decision. American Policy In Vietnam Is What It Is, In Saigon The Situation Is Anything But Normal, And I'm Happy To Have Done What I Did.

I Want To Succeed. And I Want To Succeed In The Best Way Possible, Without Caring Whether People Call My Actions Leftist Or Rightist.

The Purpose Of Life Is To Believe, To Hope, And To Strive.

Even Today To Be Civilised Is Held To Be Synonymous With Being Westernised. Advanced Countries Devote Large Resources To Formulating And Spreading Ideas And Doctrines And They Tend To Impose On The Developing Nations Their Own Norms And Methods. The Pattern Of The Classical Acquisitive Society With Its Deliberate Multiplication Of Wants Not Only Is Unsuited To Conditions In Our Countries But Is Positively Harmful.

The Sterilization Of Men Is One Method Of Birth Control. The Surest, Most Radical Method. To You It Seems Dreadful. To Me It Seems That, Properly Applied, It's By No Means Dreadful.

Nothing Can Convince Me That People Are At One With Their Work Unless They're Joyous About It.

I Always Defended My Father, As A Child, And I Think I'm Still Defending Him - His Policies At Least. Oh, He Wasn't At All A Politician, In No Sense Of The Word. He Was Sustained In His Work Only By A Blind Faith In India - He Was Preoccupied In Such An Obsessive Way By The Future Of India. We Understood Each Other.

In An Underdeveloped Society, The First Anxiety Is Of Infant Mortality. In An Advanced One It Is To Keep Alive The Aged.

The Meek May One Day Inherit The Earth, But Not The Headlines.

Ability Is Not Always Gauged By Examination.

Education Is A Liberating Force, And In Our Age It Is Also A Democratizing Force, Cutting Across The Barriers Of Caste And Class, Smoothing Out Inequalities Imposed By Birth And Other Circumstances.

Home Is Wherever I Go.

If You Only Knew What It Did To Me To Have Lived In That House Where The Police Were Bursting In To Take Everyone Away! I Certainly Didn't Have A Happy And Serene Childhood.

We Announced That There'd Be No More Starvation In India. And You Responded, 'impossible. You'll Never Succeed!' Instead We Succeeded; Today In India No One Dies Of Hunger Any More; Food Production Far Exceeds Consumption.

With Boys I Climbed Trees, Ran Races, And Wrestled. I Had No Complexes Of Envy Or Inferiority Toward Boys. At The Same Time, However, I Liked Dolls.

Every New Experience Brings Its Own Maturity And A Greater Clarity Of Vision.

New Experiences

I Don't Know How To Put On An Act; I Always Show Myself For What I Am, In Whatever Mood I'm In.

The Question Before The Advanced Nations Is Not Whether They Can Afford To Help The Developing Nations, But Whether They Can Afford Not To Do So.

Sometimes Friends Are Dangerous. We Must Be Very Careful About The Help Friends Give Us.

Never Forget That When We Are Silent, We Are One. And When We Speak We Are Two.

We Couldn't Be Everywhere, We Couldn't See Everything, And It Was Inevitable That Some Things Would Escape Us.

When It's Impossible, It's Better To Stoop To Compromise, Without Resisting And Without Complaining. People Who Complain Are Selfish.

I Was A Welfare Worker For The Indian Council For Child Welfare. I'll Tell You A Story. Rajiv Was Only Four Years Old At That Time, And Was Going To Kindergarten. One Day The Mother Of One Of His Little Friends Came To See Us And Said In A Sugary Voice, 'oh, It Must Be So Sad For You To Have No Time To Spend With Your Little Boy!' Rajiv Roared Like A Lion: 'my Mother Spends More Time With Me Than You Spend With Your Little Boy, See! Your Little Boy Says You Always Leave Him Alone So You Can Play Bridge!' I Detest Women Who Do Nothing And They Play Bridge.

We Have Believed - And We Do Believe Now - That Freedom Is Indivisible, That Peace Is Indivisible, That Economic Prosperity Is Indivisible

As A Nation, I Believe We've Acquired Faith In Ourselves.

Being Prime Minister Isn't The Only Job In Life! As Far As I'm Concerned, I Could Live In A Village And Be Satisfied.

I Can't Take It Seriously When People Get Excited And Scream That Religion Is In Danger, And Similar Stupidities.

To Me The Function Of Politics Is To Make Possible The Desirable.

However, The Treaty Exists And It Puts Us In A Different Position Toward The Soviet Union Than The One We Have Toward Other Countries. Yes, The Treaty Exists. Nor Does It Exist On Only One Side. Look How W3e're Situated Geographically And You'll See That India Is Very Important For The Soviet Union.

How Can Anybody Who Is The Head Of A Nation Afford Not To Be A Prag-matist?

Even If I Died In The Service Of The Nation, I Would Be Proud Of It. Every Drop Of My Blood... Will Contribute To The Growth Of This Nation And To Make It Strong And Dynamic.

Rebels And Non-conformists Are Often The Pioneers And Designers Of Change.

You Say This Victory Is Dangerous. I Say That Today No One Can Yet Tell If It's Dangerous, That Today I Don't See The Risks You Mention. If, However, Those Risks Should Become Reality...i'll Act In Accordance With The New Reality.

In The Face Of Such A Threat, They Had No Other Choice But To Throw Themselves To The Far Left. But Now That The People Are Conscious Of Our Efforts, Now That They See Us Resolving Problems, The Communists Are Losing Strength.

Poverty Assumes So Many Aspects Here In India. There Aren't Only The Poor That You See In The Cities, There Are The Poor Among The Tribes, The Poor Who Live In The Forest, The Poor Who Live On The Mountains. Should We Ignore Them As Long As The Poor In The Cities Are Better Off? And Better Off With Reference To What? To What People Wanted Ten Years Ago? Then It Seemed Like So Much. Today It's No Longer So Much.

I've Never Understood Women Who, Because Of Their Children, Pose As Victims And Don't Allow Themselves Any Other Activities.

I Know I'll Astonish Everyone By Talking Like This, But It's God's Truth. Honors Have Never Tempted Me And I've Never Sought Them.

In Fact The Communists Gained Strength In India When The People Thought My Party Was Moving To The Right. And They Were Correct.

Without Peace There Can Be No Prosperity For Any People, Rich Or Poor. And Yet, There Can Be No Peace Without Erasing The Harshness Of The Growing Contrast Between The Rich And The Poor.

People Often Ask Me: Who Has Influenced You The Most? Your Father? Mahatma Gandhi? Yes, My Choices Were Fundamentally Influenced By Them, By The Spirit Of Equality They Infused In Me - My Obsession For Justice Comes From My Father, Who In Turn Got It From Mahatma Gandhi.

I Am Proud That I Spent The Whole Of My Life In The Service Of My People ... I Shall Continue To Serve Until My Last Breath And When I Die, I Can Say, That Every Drop Of My Blood Will Invigorate India And Strengthen It.

My Fiancé, You See, Belonged To Another Religion. He Was A Parsi. And This Was Something Nobody Could Stand - All Of India Was Against Us. They Wrote To Gandhi, To My Fther, To Me. Insults, Death Threats. Every Day The Postman Arrived With An Enormous Sack And Dumped The Letters On The Floor. We Even Stopped Reading Them; We Let A Couple Of Friends Read Them And Tell Us What Was In Them.

Do You Know That, Until Recently, Poor People Brought Children Into The World For The Sole Purpose Of Making Use Of Them? But How Can You Change, By Force Or All Of A Sudden, An Age-old Habit? The Only Way Is To Plan Births, By One Means Or Another.

Nowadays You Can No Longer Let Yourself Be Indoctrinated - The World Is Changing So Fast! Even What You Wanted Twenty Years Ago Is No Longer Relevant Today; It's Outdated.

I Examine The Consequences Later, When A New Situation Arises And I Then Face The New Situation. And That's It.

India Had Barely Become Independent, In 1947, When Pakistan Invaded Kashmir, Which At The Time Was Ruled By A Maharajah. The Maharajah Fled, And The People Of Kashmir, Led By Sheikh Abdullah, Asked For Indian Help. Lord [louis] Mountbatten, Who Was Still Governor General, Replied That He Wouldn't Be Able To Supply Aid To Kashmir Unless Pakistan Declared War, And He Didn't Seem Bothered By The Fact That The Pakistanis Were Slaughtering The Population.

My Father Was A Saint. I'm Not.

The India I Want, I'll Never Tire Of Repeating, Is A More Just And Less Poor India, One Entirely Free Of Foreign Influences. If I Thought The Country Was Already Marching Toward These Objectives, I'd Give Up Politics Immediately And Retire As Prime Minister.

Mahatma Gandhi Was Always Talking Of Religion...he Was Convinced That Was Right...the Fact Is, We Young People Didn't Agree With Him On Many Things.

I Refuse To Indulge In Small Talk. And Compliments, If At All, I Save For After The Job Is Done.

I Grew Up Like A Boy, Also Because Most Of The Children Who Came To Our House Were Boys.

Every Democratic System Evolves Its Own Conventions. It Is Not Only The Water But The Banks Which Make The River.

The Word 'when' Is So Important For A People, For An Individual! If An Individual Thinks He Won't Do It, He'll Never Do It. Even If He's Highly Intelligent, Even If He Has Countless Talents.

To Be A Mother, A Housewife, Never Cost Me Any Sacrifice - I Savored Every Minute Of Those Years.

We Always Said That Our Struggle Was Not Only Against The British As Representatives Of Colonialism, It Was Against All The Evil That Existed In India. The Evil Of The Feudal System, The Evil Of The System Based On Caste, The Evil Of Economic Injustice.

People Tend To Forget Their Duties But Remember Their Rights.

Political Games

Forgiveness Is The Virtue Of Brave.

Muslim Women Had To Go Out In Purdah, That Heavy Sheet That Covers Even The Eyes. Hindu Women Had To Go Out In The Doli, A Kind Of Closed Sedan Chair Like A Catafalque. My Mother Always Told Me About These Things With Bitterness And Rage.

Everything I've Done, I've Done Because I Wanted To Do It. In Doing It, I've Plunged In Headlong, Always Believing In It.

I Don't See Why We And The Chinese Should Have To Be Enemies.

I Suspected [richard Nixon] Was Very Pro-pakistan. Or Rather I Knew That The Americans Had Always Been In Favor Of Pakistan - Not So Much Because They Were In Favor Of Pakistan, But Because They Were Against India.

Let's Not Forget That In India The Symbol Of Strength Is A Woman; The Goddess Shakti.

Nothing Lasts Forever, And No One Can Predict What Will Happen To Me In The Near Or Distant Future.

Nothing Lasts Forever

Satisfied Is A Word I Use Only In Reference To My Country, And I'll Never Be Satisfied For My Country. For This Reasons I Go On Taking Difficult Paths, And Between A Paved Road And A Footpath That Goes Up The Mountain, I Choose The Footpath. To The Great Irritation Of My Bodyguards.

If By Religion We Mean A Belief In Humanity Rather Than The Gods, An Effort To Make Man Better And A Little Happier, Then Yes, I'm Very Religious.

I Never Believed In The Danger Of A Third World War.

No One Ever Indoctrinated Me.

My Father Was A Saint. He Was The Closest Thing To A Saint That You Can Find In A Normal Man.

Yes, He [mahatma Gandhi] Was A Great Man. However...between Me And Gandhi There Was Never The Understanding There Was Between Me And My Father.

I Cannot Understand How Anyone Can Be An Indian And Not Be Proud.

America Always Thought It Was Helping Pakistan. But If It Hadn't Helped Pakistan, Pakistan Would Have Been A Stronger Country.

Until The Day She Died, My Mother Continued To Fight For The Rights Of Women. She Joined All The Women's Movements Of The Time; She Stirred Up A Lot Of Revolts. She Was A Great Woman, A Great Figure. Women Today Would Like Her Immensely.

Whenever You Take A Step Forward, You Are Bound To Disturb Something.

When One Has Had A Life As Difficult As Mine, One Doesn't Worry About How Others Will React.

I Think I'm Cold, Indeed Icy, Hard. Then There's Another Reason, One That Goes With My Frankness: I Don't Put On Act.

When [my Father] Asked Me To Help Him, I Really Didn't Suspect The Consequences.

All Of A Sudden Inscriptions Appeared On Walls. Signs Appeared. And That 'no' Exploded All Over India, In An Act Of Pride That Surprised Even Me. Then Even The Political Parties, All Of Them, Even The Deputies In Parliament, Said No: It's Better To Die Of Hunger Than Be Taken For A Nation Of Beggars.

In India People Can't Stomach This Attitude Of Mine, And When I Say, 'hurry Up, Let's Get To The Point,' They Feel Hurt.

No One Wanted That Marriage, No One. Even Mahatma Gandhi Wasn't Happy About It. As For My Father...it's Not True That He Opposed It, As People Say, But He Wasn't Eager For It. I Suppose Because The Fathers Of Only Daughters Would Prefer To See Them Get Married As Late As Possible.

I'm Not Interested In One Label Or The Other - I'm Only Interested In Solving Certain Problems, In Getting Where I Want To Go.

Would You Consider A Man Or A Woman To Be Complicated? Is It That Difficult To Understand Both The Sexes? We Say That We Know What The Other Sex Is All About, But Is That Really True? Perhaps The Following Witty, Funny Quotes And Sayings Can Help Simplify Things Down About Men.

There Is Not Love Where There Is No Will.

What Is Popular Need Not Necessarily Be Right Or Wise.

At First People Asked Us, 'can You Do It?' And We Kept Silent Because We Didn't Believe In Ourselves, We Didn't Believe That We Could Do Things. Today People No Longer Say To Us, 'can You?' They Say, 'when Can You?' Because The Indians Finally Believe In Themselves, They Believe They Can Do Things.

I Certainly Won't Have An Empty Life!

You Don't Help A Country By Supporting A Military Regime That Denies Any Sign Of Democracy, And What Defeated Pakistan Was Its Military Regime.

There Are Moments In History When Brooding Tragedy And Its Dark Shadows Can Be Lightened By Recalling Great Moments Of The Past.

[visiting Richard Nixon] Useful Only To Me. The Experience Taught Me That When People Do Something Against You, That Something Always Turns Out In Your Favor.

Life Is A Continuous Process Of Adjustment.

As My Father [javāharlāl Nehrū] Said, You Have To Keep An Open Mind, But You Have To Pour Something Into It - Otherwise Ideas Slip Away Like Sand Between Your Fingers.

I Suggested A Compromise To Give The Banks A Year's Time And See If They Succeed In Showing Us That Nationalization Wasn't Necessary. The Year Went By And We Realized It Hadn't Done Any Good, That The Money Still Ended Up In The Hands Of The Rich Industrialists Or Friends Of The Bankers. So I Concluded That It Was Necessary To Nationalize The Banks. And We Did. Without Considering It A Socialist Gesture Or An Antisocialist Gesture, Just A Necessary One. Anyone Who Nationalizes Only So As To Be Considered On The Left To Me Is A Fool.

The Indians And Pakistanis Are Literally Brothers.

We Should Not Mourn For Men Of High Ideals. Rather We Should Rejoice That We Had The Privilege Of Having Had Them With Us, To Inspire Us By Their Radiant Personalities.

I've Always Discovered Things For Myself, In Marvelous Freedom.

The Doctors Advised Me Not To Have Even One. My Health Was Still Not Good, And They Said That Pregnancy Might Be Fatal. If They Hadn't Said That To Me, Maybe I Wouldn't Have Got Married. But That Diagnosis Provoked Me, It Infuriated Me. I Answered, 'why Do You Think I'm Getting Married If Not To Have Children? I Don't Want To Hear That I Can't Have Children; I Want You To Tell Me What I Have To Do In Order To Have Children!'

Just When You Think You've Achieved Something, You Realize You've Achieved Nothing. And Still You Have To Go Forward Just The Same - Toward A Dream So Distant That Your Road Has Neither Beginning Nor End.

You've Never Been Very Generous, You Westerners, Toward Us Indians. You Should Have Seen That Things Were Changing, Albeit Slowly. You Should Have Seen That Something Was Happening. Not Much, But Something.

People With Clenched Fists Can Not Shake Hands.

Inspirational Life

I Discovered [joan Of Arc] Toward The Age Of Ten Or Twelve, When I Went To France. I Don't Remember Where I Read About Her, But I Recall That She Immediately Took On A Definite Importance For Me. I Wanted To Sacrifice My Life For My Country. It Seems Like Foolishness And Yet...what Happens When We're Children Is Engraved Forever On Our Lives.

In All Societies That Have Applied A Form Of Socialism, A Certain Degree Of Social Economic Equality Has Been Achieved.

Little By Little I Changed My Mind, And When I Was About Eighteen, I Began To Consider The Possibility Of Getting Married. Not To Have A Husband, But To Have Children.

It Would Seem That It Was Not In The Interest Of 'someone' For Us To Make Progress. It Was In 'someone's' Interest That We Be Always At War, That We Tear Each Other To Pieces. Yes, I'm Inclined To Absolve The Pakistanis. How Should They Have Behaved? Someone Encouraged Them To Attack Us, Someone Gave Them Weapons To Attack Us. And They Attacked Us.

I Myself, In My Heart, Say That People Should Have All The Children They Want. But It's A Mistaken Idea, Like Many Of Our Ideas That Go Back Thousands Of Years, And It Must Be Rooted Out.

I Don't Mind If My Life Goes In The Service Of The Nation. If I Die, Every Drop Of My Blood Will Invigorate The Nation.

To Become Our Enemies - What An Absurdity. A Crazy Absurdity When You Stop To Think That We, Muslims And Hindus, Had Conducted The Struggle For Independence Together.

Now I Don't Get Upset By Unpleasant Things, I Don't Play The Victim, And I'm Always Ready To Come To Terms With Life.

Forgiveness Is A Virtue Of The Brave.

I Think One Should Do What Seems Right. And If What Seems Right Involves Danger...well, One Must Risk The Danger.

It's Not At All Hard To Reconcile The Two Things If You Organize Your Time Intelligently. Even When My Sons Were Little, I Was Working.

Do You Know Why I Won The Last Elections? It Was Because The People Liked Me, Yes, Because I Had Worked, Yes, But Also Because The Opposition Had Behaved Badly Toward Me. And Do You Know Why I Won This War? Because My Army Was Able To Do It, Yes, But Also Because The Americans Were On The Side Of Pakistan.

If I Die A Violent Death, As Some Fear And A Few Are Plotting, I Know That The Violence Will Be In The Thought And The Action Of The Assassins, Not In My Dying.

My Father Was A Statesman, I'm A Political Woman. My Father Was A Saint. I'm Not.

A Lot Of Mythology Arose After [mahatma Gandhi] Death. But The Fact Remains That He Was An Exceptional Man, Terribly Intelligent, With Tremendous Intuition For People, And A Great Instinct For What Was Right.

Defeats Are Always Pitiful. Victories Are Always Last Resources.

I Want To State That There Will Be Friendship Between Bangladesh And Ourselves. And Not A One-sided Friendship, Of Course - No One Does Anything For Nothing; Each Has Something To Give And Something To Take.

What Good Does It Do To Remain Tied To An Ideology If You Don't Achieve Anything By It? I Have An Ideology Myself - You Can't Work In A Vacuum; You Have To Have Faith In Something.

Mankind Will Endure When The World Appreciates The Logic Of Diversity.

Popularity Is Not A Gurantee Of Quality.

There Are Only Moments Of Happiness - From Contentment To Ecstacy.

Moments Of Happiness

In Any Case, I Married Feroze Gandhi. Once I Get An Idea In My Head, No One In The World Can Make Me Change My Mind.

Opportunities Are Not Offered. They Must Be Wrested And Worked For. And This Calls For Perseverance... And Courage.

When I'm Not Governing My Country Any More, I'll Go Back To Taking Care Of Children. Or Else I'll Start Studying Anthropology - It's A Science That's Always Interested Me Very Much, Also In Relation To The Problem Of Poverty. Or Else I'll Go Back To Studying History - At Oxford I Took My Degree In History. Or Else...i Don't Know, I'm Fascinated By The Tribal Communities. I Might Busy Myself With Them.

For Me The Only Point That Has Remained Unchanged Through The Years Is That In India There Is Still So Much Poverty.

[mahatma Gandhi] Said That The First President Of India Ought To Be A Harijan Girl, An Untouchable. He Was So Against The Class System And The Oppression Of Women That An Untouchable Woman Became For Him The Epitome Of Purity And Benediction.

The Power To Question Is The Basis Of All Human Progress.

Inspirational Life

You Soon Realize That The Peak You've Climbed Was One Of The Lowest, That The Mountain Was Part Of A Chain Of Mountains, That There Are Still So Many, So Many Mountains To Climb...and The More You Climb, The More You Want To Climb - Even Though You're Dead Tired.

The Old Need The Company Of The Young So That They Renew Their Contact With Life.

To Become Capable, One Must Have Faith In Oneself.

You Must Learn To Be Still In The Midst Of Activity And To Be Vibrantly Alive In Repose.

As I Always Say, I Do Not Wish You An Easy Time, But I Wish You That Whatever Difficulty You May Have, You Will Overcome It.

The Immediate Is Often The Enemy Of The Ultimate.

I Had Recently Had The Impression They Were Changing - Not So Much By Becoming Less Pro-pakistan As By Becoming Less Anti-india. I Was Wrong. My Visit To [richard] Nixon Did Anything But Avert The War.

I Went Back Into Politics Only When It Was Clear That Things Weren't Going As They Should Have In My Party. I Was Always Arguing, I Argued With Everyone - With My Father, With The Leaders I Had Known Since I Was A Child...and One Day, It Was In 1955, One Of Them Exclaimed, 'you Do Nothing But Criticize! If You Think You Can Correct Things, Correct Them. Go Ahead, Why Don't You Try?' Well, I Could Never Resist A Challenge, So I Tried.

My Father Was Prime Minister, And To Take Care Of His Home, To Be His Hostess, Automatically Meant To Have My Hands In Politics - To Meet People, To Know Their Games, Their Secrets.

I Assure You We'll Go On Making Our Decisions Without Worrying Whether It Pleases Or Displeases The Soviet Union, China, America, France, Or Anyone Else.

Life Is Always Full Of Dangers And I Don't Think One Should Avoid Dangers.

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