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.

When it's impossible, it's better to stoop to compromise, without resisting and without complaining. People who complain are selfish.

If by happiness you mean ecstasy ... Yes, I've known ecstasy, and it's a blessing to be able to say it because those who can say it are very few. But ecstasy doesn't last long and is seldom if ever repeated.

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.

Even I, when I was a student in London, often wore Western clothes, and yet I'm the most Indian Indian I know.

In India's distant past, when the population was low, the blessing given a woman was, 'May you have many children.' Most of our epics and literature stress this wish, and the idea that a woman should have many children hasn't declined.

The future doesn't frighten me, even if it threatens to be full of other difficulties.