Vinod Naidu,

Chief Manager (Maint.)

Chilakaluripeta, S/s, SR-I

India @ 75 : Self Reliance with Integrity and Value Education

Introduction: India has been always a self-sufficient country with its people /society possessing
high moral values imbedded with Integrity, strong value system, ethics, discipline, tolerance,
cooperation and a feeling of unity in diversity.
The foreign invasions /Invaders tried to weaken and break this rich culture filled with self respect
and integrity. They tried to make us feel inferior compared to them , compared to their
language ,foods, living styles , etc etc , but our culture , our people, our mental strength ,our will
power which is based on the high moral values stood strong against all odds . And even after so
much destruction, loots, bloodsheds, manipulation of mindsets etc , the roots of Tree called Bharat
Mata are so strong that the tree has survived and now it is blossoming again to its fullest and
proving to the world that India is Self sufficient , Self Reliant and can progress in any adverse
circumstances.
The British left our country in disarray, initiating so many religious, geographical, lingual conflicts
and made the whole system to run on their language , formats and methods which was primarily
centralized . Post Independence our country faced so many big problems and challenges like the
religious conflicts, the famine of 1965/66 , Emergency imposition , the wars with Pakistan & China
, the economic crisis in 1991 , naxalism, terrorism , Internal divisive politics and Corruption , but
even after all these obstacles the growth has not stopped for the tree Mother India . It has been
slowly growing among all adversities and now shining and blossoming and we all are dreaming and
hoping that the spring season will come for this tree by 2022 with India @ 75 year of Independence
and that season will last forever .
Now, there should be something in the roots of our people, our society our culture that has helped
us all fight all these adversities and setbacks and helped us come back more and more strongly.
What might be that something?. something which cant be broken, which cant be taken away, which
can’t be faded and which becomes more and more strong in testing times: its our deep rooted
sense of integrity ,both individual and public ,embedded in the value system from time
immemorial . Integrity brings in self-confidence and self-confidence ropes in self-reliance.
Self-Reliance and Integrity:
Self-reliance and Integrity both go hand in hand. Self-reliance is trusting one’s ability, capacities
and working hard in a right direction with right motives, even when the conformity of majority is in
other direction. Emerson says “Self-reliance is the mark of an individual is being able to stand
alone”. It is being true to yourself and your morals in the midst of trying times all around you.
Integrity is the habit of being honest and displaying consistent and uncompromising adherence to
strong moral and ethical principles and values. Integrity is the inner sense of "wholeness" deriving
from qualities such as honesty and consistency of character. It is following the right path, upholding
the moral values set by family, society and organization in which we work and sticking to the truth
always in all circumstances.

How Self reliance and Integrity related:

Emerson says “ In order to be truly self reliant , one must be willing to state the truth today and
again tomorrow even if they seem to contradict one another” . Now to state the truth , one needs to
have integrity , and thus we can say from integrity self reliance is evolved . When we habitually
make decisions from a place of Integrity and only from that perspective , all our actions form a
line , a pattern , a recognizable tone. We don’t have to worry about being consistent if we make
righteous decisions . Emerson also states that “ Actions and choices coming out of Integrity
compound to effect change larger than the sum of its parts .” We create history of prudent
decisions and build a history of Integrity.
Conformity seeks acceptance by society, Morality determines the prudent course of action
regardless of the society’s opinion. Morality means having integrity and making the prudent course
of action shows self-reliance. Thus Self-reliance and Integrity go hand in hand.

India @ 75 :
India @ 75 is a initiative taken by the Central Govt and envisions how India should be in her 75 th
year of Independence and seeks to bring all stake holders including Govt, Industry , Institutions,
community groups and individuals to translate the Vision into a reality
Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav is an initiative of the Government of India to celebrate and
commemorate 75 years of progressive India and the glorious history of it’s people, culture and
achievements. Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav is an embodiment of all that is progressive about India’s
socio-cultural, political and economic identity. 
Today India is doing and achieving feats which cant be imagined a few years ago and is
progressing in all fields from Education, agriculture, Medical fields , Science & Technology ,
Industries , Infrastructure, Health services , Sanitation ,Public services, Judicial services, public
safety etc. Now lets discuss , how our country can become more progressive and vibrant in all
fields by the 75th year of Independence through the most Important moral value called Integrity ,
which gives rise to self reliance i.e “ atam nirbharta “ :
1. Education : This field is the most important as education is the base for all understanding
of right or wrong . Home and School set up are the basic sources of moral education and
developing life skills and self sufficiency in children. Famous mystic J. Krishnamurti says
“ The core aim of basic education is to help students to develop self-sufficiency.
Education should develop human values in the child. It is aimed to achieve the harmonious
development of the child's body, mind, heart and soul. It is geared to create useful,
responsible and dynamic citizens.” The main purpose of education should be to know what
is right and what is wrong and to enable students to move forward in the right path
overcoming all obstacles .
J.Krishnamurty says “ The main aim of education is to enable the child to develop
mentally in such a way that he should know himself. The intentions of education must be
the inner transformation and liberation of the human being and, from that, society would be
transformed.”
Education is the major medium to apply our thoughts or ideas or beliefs into practice, as
such the education system should be such that the thoughts generated are always positive,
creative, ethical and value based. If the education system inculcates high moral values and
self-sufficiency in students, then whatever they become or achive in furture , it will be
always based on those values only . Whether they become an engineer, doctor, lawyer,
politician, teacher or a defence personal, they will always stick to their moral values of
Intergrity and honesty and thus be always self-reliant and will not bother about conformity.

The present issues with the education system:

 Present education system, is confined to marks and degrees promoting fear in
students and compelling them to adjust in set pattern. By capturing in the set
patterns, it debars child to think innovatively, creatively and critically. The ability
to think in one own way, the ability to observe and enquire, the ability of to express
freely and the ability to imagine and to be creative is being curbed and suppressed
due to this fear, in the present education system. This will allow to promote wrong
values like love for Money. Power and Prestige. The individuals and society will
not be self-sufficient and fearless. The mind becomes so conditioned that the child
fears to go against others if they are wrong, fears to go against conformity and
wrong ideologies and fears to think freely.
 The teachers and parents are also concerned about the quantitative results of the
child and not at all concerned about the qualitative aspects of education. The whole
concentration and energy is being used for achieving quantitative results only. So
 now a days there is no room for moral values, ethical values, life skills etc in the
curriculam of schools and colleges or even in home.
What needs to be done :

 Firstly the over emphasis on marks, grades to be decreased . The system should be
such that the child can express his views freely, can think freely , can challenge
anything which he /she founds wrong. Then only the fearlessness will develop and
the strength to go against the wrong path will come in individuals . Most of us just
conform to wrong doings just because of fear , fear of being rejected , fear of being
singled out , fear being unsuccessful if not conforming to set pattern. Once this fear
is curbed at the basic education platform in school and home , then the individuals
developing from that environment will automatically posses high values , Integrity
and which in turn help them being self reliant and subsequently pursue their goals
unabated .
 Development of True and New Values : The wrong values like money, position,
power , authority are very much prevalent and need to be replaced by the correct
values of Integrity, Sharing, Sacrifice and Love . The education system should help
the students discover the true values . For this the curriculum needs to be modified
and the moral values lectures, subjects needs to be compulsorily included in the
academic curriculum and the teachers identified to teach these should also be of
high experience and impartial in approach.
 The intelligence level should be tried to be increased rather than just providing
ready made information and notes to memorize , which curbs the ability to think .
The students should be trained to deal with the problems of life intelligently
according to circumstances . This will help in developing individuals, who can
stand strong in all circumstances with their moral values .
 The ability , capability and interest should be taken care and the student should be
able to discover what is right path for them . This will lead to satisfaction and hence
will ultimately lead to upholding of moral values and help in remaining self
sufficient
The National Education Policy 2020 is one initiative by the Govt in this path of
providing holistic education to all . The policy is a comprehensive framework for
elementary education to higher education as well as vocational training in both rural
and urban India. The policy aims to transform India's education system by 2040. It aims
at making India a global knowledge superpower.  no one will be forced to study any
particular language and that the medium of instruction will not be shifted from English
to any regional language.
 The "10 + 2" structure will be replaced with "5+3+3+4" model. Instead of exams being
held every academic year, school students will only attend three exams, in classes 2, 5
and 8. This policy aims at reducing the curriculum load of students and allowing them
to be more "inter-disciplinary" and "multi-lingual". One example given was "If a
student wants to pursue fashion studies with physics, or if one wants to learn bakery
with chemistry, they'll be allowed to do so." Report cards will be "holistic", offering
information about the student's skills.
2. Corruption Free Organizations , Beauracracy and Politics : To see India shining and
blossoming, the corruption level existing in the country in various fields needs to be
reduced to minimum.
The Corruption Perception Index as published by Transparency International , of India is 40
and is ranked 86th among the 180 countries in the level of corruption. Denmark,
Newzealand and Finland are the least corrupt countries with CPI score of 88/100. Thus to
get at par with the developed countries , the corruption level in our country needs to be
reduced . Corruption is existing in all fields and organizations even after existence of the
Anti Corruption Bureau, CVCs, etc . Although these agencies have succeeded in reducing
corruption to some extent , but not in a holistic way . This is because the genesis of
corruption in an individual/ society /organization is the degradation moral value system and
weakness of law enforcing agencies, which are mainly based on evidences and proofs of
corruption.
The present policies are preventive , which try to prevent corruption by inculcating fear of
punishment , fear of humility , fear of financial /employment loss etc. However , very less
stress is given to encourage the strength of honesty and gel the honest people together.
Even though the corrupt are very less in number than the honest people , they rule and
boldly do corruption.
There should be a Bureau of Honesty, which identifies honest people, brings them
together and unites them together and makes them stronger. In a manner , a goon is
supported by a goon , a honest person should be supported by another honest person . But
for this , the honest people should be integrated , identified , made famous not only by the
individual fans but by the Govt Further there should be proper protection system for the
honest people while discharging their duties. Some dedicated strong security /personal
guards to be made always available with them while discharging dangerous tasks. The
family should also be provided proper protection .
There is a Whistle blower policy , which states that personal data will be kept confidential ,
but still the whistle blower gets harmed . Anoymous complaints are not entertained . Why ?
When we say in court that “ even if 99 criminals get freed but not a single innocent
should not be punished “ and with this notion many criminals are not punished due to
lack of evidences and corrupt judgements. Then why not this notion is applied in
 acknowledging anonymous complaints of corruption. Even if 99 complaints are fake ,
but one complaint can be correct . Moreover when anonymous complaints are taken ,
the complainant remains safe and will get encouragement to provide more evidences.

Are Honest people are becoming weaker than the dishonest people ? No certainly not, in
terms of self determination , courage and ethical values , but they lack support from system,
society and fellow colleagues ( which prefer to remain neutral) . Due to this insecurity, the
honest people are refraining from showing integrity in social issues. They just confine their
vigilant integrity to themselves only.
Integrity can’t be confined to individual self; it is always a broader term involving society
and nation. We need to encourage the honest people to come out of their self-made/system
made shells and participate in building a better society and nation, so that India @75 and
after 75 becomes more and more bright and prosperous country.
Integrity of individual will develop integrity in society and will make both of them self-
reliant and self-sufficient in themselves.
Young honest people should join Politics , so that the present trend of corrupt and rowdy
people entering politics is slowly curbed . For this , the people casting their votes should
support them and keep aside their personal agendas of power , caste, favourism etc at bay.
Only when honest, dedicated and educated people get support in entering politics , then
only the corruption in political system will reduce. After handing the stick to the Monkey
we cant control it .

3. Equal Opportunity and Development of all:

Here also the Integrity Factor plays a big role. Avoiding favours to a specific individual,
group or community , will provide equal opportunities to all and thus will help in making
all self reliant . To be impartial, to teart everyone as equal is also a part of Integrity .
A vibrant and progressive India can be possible only if all people are contributing and for
getting contribution from all people , everyone should be self reliant and self sufficient .

Conclusion : To see India @ 75 years like a vibrant , colourful and blossoming flower , which
will increase its radiance day after day , the people ,society and systems should be self reliant ,
robust should be able to withstand and overcome all obstacles . This can be achieved by value
based education system , corruption free systems ,by providing equal opportunities for development
of all . This is turn is possible only if core value of all individuals, society and systems is
INTEGRITY. Integrity is to be everywhere , it has to be like the omnipresent God , only then the
dream of 360 degree development of India and its citizens is possible with self reliance.
I conclude with this evergreen quote from Jim George “Integrity Never Goes out of style.” and
extend the quote like this “Integrity Never goes out of style, because it brings self reliance and self
reliance once developed is always self maintaining and free flowing, devoid of fear and
apprehensions”.

जहाँ डाल-डाल पर सोने की चिड़ियां करती है बसेरा

वो भारत दे श है मेरा
जहाँ सत्य, अहिंसा और धर्म का पग-पग लगता डेरा
वो भारत दे श है मेरा
जय भारती, जय भारती, जय भारती

Shri Vinod Naidu is BE (Electrical) from GEC Rewa, MP and he has been working with POWERGRID
since 2008. He is being contributing in the field of construction and maintenance of S/s. Now, he is
presently pursuing MA (Psychology) from IGNOU.