Address of the President of India at the Indian High School, Dubai

I am delighted to be among all the children, their teaching staff and parents here in your school in Dubai. Children in their innocence have a pure and noble mind and they enter our beautiful universe with a natural urge to seek and know more and more about themselves, and the world of life and man. Education is a societal response to satisfy this urge, and perfection in education has always been the goal of enlightened societies. Education in the arts and sciences, and vocational training are perhaps the necessary conditions for a strong knowledge base; but perfection is achieved when the school interweaves these subjects with Education in Human Values.

Marvels of Universe

Friends, we should note that human mind is a unique gift. You can enter into Marvels of Universe only if you have curiosity and thinking. I suggest, thinking should become your capital asset, no matter whatever ups and downs you come across in your life. Thinking is progress. Non-thinking is stagnation to the individual, organization and the country. Thinking leads to action. Knowledge without action is useless and irrelevant. Knowledge with action brings prosperity. As a Principal, you have to cultivate the young minds to explore every aspect of human life. Look at the sky. We are not alone. The whole universe is friendly to us and conspires only to give the best to those who dream. Like Subramaniam Chandrasekhar discovered the black hole through a quest, why most of the stars shine and few die. Today, using Chandrasekar limit we can calculate how long the sun will shine. Like, Sir CV Raman looked at the sea and the sky, and questioned why the sea should be blue? This led to the birth of Raman Effect, he found the blue of the sea was due to the molecular scattering of light and was not a case of reflection of the sky in water as most people imagined. Like, Albert Einstein, armed with the complexity of the universe, asked the question how the universe was born. The famous equation E=mc2 arrived, which can be used for the generation of electricity using nuclear materials and also lead to nuclear weapons. In India during 1960's one important event took place, Prof. Vikram Sarabhai gave a vision for the nation on the space programme. He said, India should build her own rocket system, build communication and remote sensing satellites, integrate and launch from Indian space launch centers and put them into the geosynchronous orbit and sun synchronous orbit. Today India can build any type of rocket systems and satellite and launch in a specified orbit.

Millions of people walk in this universe. But during last millennium one noble soul walked and walked in the Indian soil giving application of ahimsa dharma leading to Indian independence. My dear friends, can you make the students to dream to become a noble minded persons like Mahatma Gandhi or Sir CV Raman or Einstein, or Subramaniam Chandrasekhar or Vikram Sarabhai. Look at the marvels of your universe. You create great thinkers among the students and they become creators.

Glimpses of Indian Technological growth

After Independence, India has made significant achievements in agriculture and food production, energy, healthcare, education and various fields of science and technology. Particularly we have made our mark in the international arena in the fields of health care, pharmaceuticals, information technology, mass media and communication, space, defence and nuclear science

Dream, hard work and perseverance

Dream, Dream, Dream

Dream transforms into thoughts

Thoughts results into action.

Knowledge Card

Proper learning makes a person great and self-reliant.

Learning gives creativity

Creativity leads to thoughts

Thinking provides knowledge

Knowledge makes you great

What can I do for you?

Every one of us has gone through the various phases of education from childhood to profession. A scene appears in front of me. A child, a teenager, an adult and a leader. How does each one react to a particular situation? The situation is human need. The child cries, it means, "I need it, you give me. The teenager says, "I want to do it alone and leave me alone". The adult proclaims, "let us do it together". The leader's quality is "what can I do for you". A child's attitude is 'you give me', the leaders attitude is 'what I can do for you'. So, the teachers have got a tremendous responsibility to convert the attitude of child 'of you give me' to the attitude of a leader when they grow up - 'what I can do for you'. That will demand a teacher to be a visionary with an inspiring capability.

Here I would like to narrate the question of a young boy from Rajkot. He asked me, "How can we effectively and practically work for your and our mission of making India a developed and prosperous nation?" I was delighted when he wanted to know what students in general and he himself in particular can do for the nation. I told, "Students should fix a goal in their life, concentrate to combat and overcome the hurdles and achieve excellence. They must imbibe moral values. They should aspire to become entrepreneurs. During holidays students can teach poor and underprivileged children and create a mission for them. They can plant trees and contribute towards improving ecological balance. These activities will collectively lead towards development and prosperity."

I am sure, the best of creativity among the students will emerge by integrated influence of principals, teachers, parents and family as a whole.

Evolution of Enlightened citizen

The evolution of good human beings is indeed a big challenge for us that will make the country secure and prosperous. I was asking myself, what would be the components of such a mission? Will it consist of education system to generate enlightened citizens? That means a combination of learning with value systems. This process can take place during the student's education. This covers one third of the population at any point of time in our country. The second important component will be the religions graduating into spiritual movement. Third and most vital component is the poverty eradication by attaining economic prosperity resulting in high employment potential.

Empowerment

When the child is empowered by the parents, at various phases of growth, the child transforms into a responsible citizen. When the teacher is empowered with knowledge and experience, good young human beings with value systems take shape. When individual or a team is empowered with technology, transformation to higher potential for achievement is assured. When the leader of any institution empowers his or her people, leaders are born who can change the nation in multiple areas. When the women are empowered, society with stability and peace is assured. When the political leaders of the nation empower the people through visionary policies, the prosperity of the nation is certain. The medium for transformation to developed India is the empowerment at various levels with power of knowledge. This empowerment should lead to a prosperous, happy, secured and enlightened India. I wish all success to the members of this campus in this great mission.

Education with value system

In India, the younger generation below 20 years is nearly 300 million that is 1/3 of the population at any point of time and their learning process takes places during their education phase. The children work and live in the school for about 25,000 hours before they complete 10+2. Though the whole learning process takes place in the school campus, the value addition to the learning process has to be provided by father, mother and the schoolteacher.

Sir CV Raman looked at the sea and the sky, and questioned why the sea should be blue? This led to the birth of Raman Effect, he found the blue of the sea was due to the molecular scattering of light and was not a case of reflection of the sky in water as most people imagined. He got the Nobel Price for Raman Effect. Sir CV Raman led teaching and research in Physics and created great scientific leaders and also the birth of Raman Research Institute, Bangalore. I would like to quote Sir CV Raman, at the age of 82, while addressing young graduates. The message is still reverberating in my mind: "I would like to tell the young men and women before me not to lose hope and courage. Success can only come to you by courageous devotion to the task lying in front of you. I can assert without fear of contradiction that the quality of the Indian mind is equal to the quality of any Teutonic, Nordic or Anglo-Saxon mind. What we lack is perhaps courage, what we lack is perhaps driving force that takes one anywhere. We have, I think, developed an inferiority complex. I think what is needed in India today is the destruction of that defeatist spirit. We need a spirit of victory, a spirit that will carry us to our rightful place under the sun, a spirit that will recognise that we, as inheritors of a proud civilization, are entitled to a rightful place on this planet. If that indomitable spirit were to arise, nothing can hold us from achieving our rightful destiny."

Those were the words from the Nobel laureate scientist of India. You would see the bridge of science and society. Friends, I request all who are responsible for the young, all who are creators of the young, for the children's growth, allow them to dream. Dream transforms into thoughts and thoughts result into actions.

The ignited minds of the young are the most powerful resource on the earth, above the earth and under the earth. This makes me recall two Thirukkurals by Saint Thiruvallur :

Aakkam Atarvinayac Cellum acaivila

Ukka mudaiya nulai

Success and wealth will seek out their way, and reach the person who has an inflexible will and systematic diligence. Good fortune will search out for the man who has an indomitable spirit as well as an unremitting zeal.

Ulluvathellam uyarvullal matratu

Tallinum tellamai nirttu

Think ever of rising higher. Let it be your only thought. Even if your object be not attained, the thought itself will have raised you.

These two kurals are of immense value to the student community. They should take the message and practice them in all their activities. Teachers should cultivate and imbibe this spirit among the student community.

Righteousness

Recently, I heard a hymn in a divine campus, which I would like to share with you. The name of the hymn is 'Peace in the World':

Where there is righteousness in the heart

There is a beauty in the character.

When there is beauty in the character, There is

harmony in the home.

When there is harmony in the home.

There is order in the nation.

When there is order in the nation,

There is peace in the world.

Friends, we can see a beautiful connectivity between heart, character, nation and the world. How to inject righteousness in the human heart? This is indeed the purpose of human creation - that is divinity. We are going through a complex situation as many of us are completely at war with ourselves, with society and with nation. At every instant there is a war in our mind, whether we should go in one direction or another. Whenever there is a dilemma, we must seek the wisdom from the Almighty to lead us to the path of righteousness through education with value system.