If I'm happy, I look happy; if I'm angry, I show it. Without worrying about how others may react.

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.

The longer one doesn't write, the more difficult it is to communicate.

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.

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.

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.

I cannot understand how anyone can be an Indian and not be proud.