I come from a political family. My father was a freedom fighter. He was a prominent leader of the locality and member of the Congress party. He spent 10 years in British prisons. In the evening, in our living room, the only subject we used to discuss was politics. So politics was not unfamiliar to me.

There is no humiliation more abusive than hunger.

I feel that when the reforms in UN take place and the Security Council will be expanded in the permanent membership category, India will have a place, I hope so, but first it is to be expanded.

The young people of India will build a strong and powerful nation, a nation that is politically mature and economically strong, a nation whose people enjoy both a high quality of life as well as justice.

I have seen vast, perhaps unbelievable, changes during the journey that has brought me from the flicker of a lamp in a small Bengal village to the chandeliers of Delhi.

India is content with itself, and driven by the will to sit on the high table of prosperity. It will not be deflected in its mission by noxious practitioners of terror.

Indian president does not determine policy. Here President is not the policy maker. In the name of the president, the cabinet takes the policy decision.