Time to get together and tell societal ills – Quit India

By M Venkaiah Naidu

History not only holds a mirror to our past but also acts as a lighthouse to our future if we learn from the past and make a new beginning. The Quit India movement was one such game-changing event that brought the country together and hastened the departure of the British from our soil.

At a time when the world was torn asunder by war, Mahatma Gandhi remained committed to ahimsa and gave a stirring call to countrymen to “Do or Die”.


His call for mass non-violent struggle created an unprecedented national awakening against the British rule. It also made the then US President FD Roosevelt support India’s right to self-determination.

In a momentous speech on August 8, 1942 – at Mumbai’s Gowalia Tank Maidan Park, since renamed as August Kranti Maidan – the Mahatma said, “I believe that in the history of the world, there has not been a more genuinely democratic struggle for freedom than ours. I read Carlyle’s French Revolution while I was in prison, and Pandit Jawaharlal has told me something about the Russian revolution.

But it is my conviction that inasmuch as these struggles were fought with the weapon of violence they failed to realise the democratic ideal.

In the democracy which I have envisaged, a democracy established by nonviolence, there will be equal freedom for all. Everybody will be his own master. It is to join a struggle for such democracy that I invite you today. Once you realise this you will forget the differences between the Hindus and Muslims, and think of yourselves as Indians only, engaged in the common struggle for independence.”

Today, more than 71 years after achieving our hard fought freedom, it is the cardinal responsibility of all of us to strive to fulfil the dreams of the Father of the Nation and other national icons who sacrificed their lives so that all of us can be free and pursue our individual and collective dreams.

At a time when India is poised to become one of the leading economies in the world in the next 15-20 years, we cannot allow our country’s progress to be hampered by obstacles such as poverty, illiteracy, glaring urban-rural divide, gender discrimination, agrarian distress and a lopsided growth across the country with a few islands of prosperity.

Probably, the time has come to completely reorient our public and social discourses towards objectives that will enable India to scale greater heights and help build a New India where nobody thinks in terms of caste, religion or region and places the country’s interests above everything else.

How can we allow the wheels of progress to move rapidly if we don’t empower poorest of the poor, farmers, women, rural artisans and the youth? Education is the key to empower every section economically, politically and socially.

Various government programmes, such as Beti Bachao-Beti Padhao, Mudra Bank, Skill India, Stand-Up India, Startup India, Khelo India and Jan-Dhan-Aadhar-Mobile are aimed at empowering the neglected and marginalised sections of the society.

A huge national awakening is needed to convert our Swarajya into Surajya and ensure that every Indian is part of an inclusive growth story as envisioned by our freedom fighters and founding fathers of the Constitution.

There are disturbing trends that negate the basic principles enshrined in our Constitution. Let us remember the wise words of Dr BR Ambedkar in 1949: “But let us not forget that this independence has thrown on us great responsibilities. By Independence, we have lost the excuse of blaming the British for anything going wrong. If hereafter things go wrong, we will have nobody to blame except ourselves.” It is time we started living the values we have enshrined in our scriptures and our Constitution.

As the Telugu poet Gurajada Appa Rao said, “Vatti maatalu kattipettoi, Gattimel thalapettavoi (Enough of idle talk, my friend, Get down to doing some tangible work).” Let us, therefore, get down to getting rid of all impediments and societal ills and squarely tell them in their face, “Quit India!”

(The author is the Vice President of India)