What is Patriotism?
2008
By:
Rishabh Srivastava - Profile
There are 164 more posts on Jai Hind: Proud to be an Indian by Rishabh Srivastava
Categories:
History, Society, Youth
Tags:
Hisory, Independence, india, Patriotism, Society, Youth
16 Comments
Join the discussion»
No. of views: 7,604
(3 votes, average: 5 out of 5)
Loading ...
Print This
THE NATION celebrating its 61st Independence Day. India’s struggle for Independence is a saga of those thousands of men, women and even children who sacrificed their lives for the freedom of the nation. And so by celebrating Independence Day, a homage is paid to all those who fought to bring Independence to our country. But gone are the days when every Indian citizen valued the importance of this great day. Time has eroded those sentiments and now we observe this day just like any other day or a holiday. Children are forced to go to schools to attend the flag hoisting ceremony by making attendance compulsory. Children seems to have no feeling for this day and the same can be said for the adults in our country also.
The Oxford dictionary defines patriotism as devoted love, support, and defence of one’s country; national loyalty. But the word patriotism cannot be restricted and is very subjective in nature. One need not play cricket matches or fight wars to express their feeling of patriotism. Our emotions run high when India thrashes Pakistan in any sports or when a businessman of Indian origin, staying abroad, makes it big in the world. We feel so much patriotic when a lady of Indian origin (who has hardly been in India) goes into space. The episode of Sunita Williams and consequent celebrations in India clearly exhibit to what extent we are obsessed with the Western culture.
The youth of the country while studying only thinks of moving out to America or United Kingdom and settle abroad and earn money for the foreign nation. They give reason that there is no infrastructure in our country, there are hardly any avenues, scope to make it big and fulfill one’s ambition. This might be true, but isn’t it our responsibility to facilitate such an environment in our country? APJ Abdul Kalam has mentioned in his book ’Wings of Fire’ that “never think of the scope, work hard to create that scope.” Kalam rejected several offers from abroad and stayed in this country and contributed to making India a nuclear power. That is the resolve of a real patriotic person.
The problem is that we are so much obsessed with foreign labels. This is really a dangerous trend. We are losing our own identity in the process. We have no interest in our history, culture and our country’s growth. We are aping Western countries, leaving behind our nation. But we are very selective while aping as well. Why is it so? The whole of America and UK come out on the road to celebrate their Independence Day. The whole nation stands by their armed forces not only during war times, but during any crisis. They share the success and failure of their country together. They dream of taking their nation to new heights. Do you feel same for India?
There is so much negative thoughts about India in one’s mind and quite often we just don’t want to discuss or talk about it. There was a very famous dialogue in the movie Rang De Basanti, which said “koi bhi desh perfect nahi hota, usse perfect banana padta hai” (no nation is perfect, it has to be made perfect). And who’s responsibility is it to make it perfect? Do you expect someone else to improve the scenario of your nation and when that happens you will happily return to your nation to contribute to the development. Right?
Author Shiv Khera said that if we are not part of the solution, then we are the problem. Our country has made advancements in almost all sectors but there is still greater distance to cover. There are some problems that are still unattended and we need to work on that. A nation does not become great with slogans. It becomes great when its citizens do great things. We just don’t want to fight the injustice and battle for our integrity. We need to change ourself and drive this nation forward. We need to be a part of the system and bring some positive changes.
Politics is not a dirty game, it’s just that there are dirty players. That’s all. If you say that you don’t promote wrong things and you are neutral then that is paradox. If you don’t oppose injustice and crime then you are certainly encouraging it. The vision of Independent India became a reality when our freedom fighters came together and fought the imperialists, which was initially considered impossible.
India is not the only country with problems but is certainly amongst the few that does not throw up the solution. As a responsible citizen, we need to provide the solutions.
There is so much an individual can contribute towards the progress of our nation. We need to improve the tone of our social and economic life through improved work ethics and environmental behaviour. Let us rally behind our flag, let us love our country with all its faults, let us work to improve it with all our strength, let us defend it with all our resources, let us hand it on to the coming generations better than what it was when we received it. Let us try to build a nation, which our freedom fighters dreamt of. That will be the real tribute to them!
Remember one thing- the country is our mother and we have to be responsible enough to say that I am going to take care of her.
Jai Hind.
Liked this article? Subscribe to the RSS feed or Subscribe by email
yaar u saved me your tag helped me for my debate competetion… thanks…..
in what way it helped u?? do let me know. Moreover please forward the link to concerned citizens….
[...] sentiments of patriotism, in an effort to become more Westernized. Rishabh Srivatsava on his blog, “Jai Hind: Proud to be Indian” shows disappointment toward the youth of India, and their lack of interest to bring India to the [...]
thanks alot
thanks 4 showing ur feeling towards your nation.im impressed.it helped me a lot.thanks once again.
Your link has given me a great deal of information on India. Its not that I could not find it elsewhere, but as I went through our link, I found it very interactive and most important its upto date! Usually on other sites the updates and postings are years ago.
Im working on something that will bring more awareness into the lives of people. I need your help for the same.May I use some of your information from this site to serve the purpose of awareness of citizens of India? I assure you that Im not using this for business or any income related purpose.
Will be awaiting for your reply soon.
And I must say, ” YOU HAVE DONE AN EXCELLENT JOB.Keep up the great work.And THANK YOU.”
Pallavi
@Pallavi
Please email me more about how you wish to use the information on email (AT) miteshashar (DOT) com
An excellent comment made by Ms.Pallavi Nagarkatti on ” What is Patriotism? ” on this repective link and What made me feel is the 2nd paragraph where it says ?the word patriotism cannot be restricted and is very subjective in nature. One need not play cricket matches or fight wars to express their feeling of patriotism. Our emotions run high when India thrashes Pakistan in any sports or when a businessman of Indian origin, staying abroad, makes it big in the world. We feel so much patriotic when a lady of Indian origin (who has hardly been in India) goes into space. The episode of Sunita Williams and consequent celebrations in India clearly exhibit to what extent we are obsessed with the Western culture”
This is my first article i read and touched my heart.i have also ask my friends to reffer and also sent link to my friends on there email id.
I really appreciate to this link and specially to the subject where a very special question is answered …”WHAT IS PATRIOTISM ? “. and also Ms.Pallavi Nagarkatti to encourage such articles.
KEEP GOING WE ALL INDIANS ARE WITH YOU AND OUR NATION.
Excellent JOB done by you.
JAI HIND.
CHETAN
its really good… being an software engineer and serving the other nation.. doesn’t make any sense … but in the present scenario i have to work for others… sorry for myself.. and sorry for the fate of ma mother land..
PATRITISM IS THE FEELING OF BEING PROUD OF ONE`S COUNTRY
men should not forget the great men who sacrificed their life for our nation’s freedom..
we must never forget the great mean who have sacrificed for our nation’s independence….
Didn’t like it at all —-
I really want the statistics on how this article is based on. Why are we so pesimistic in our outlook with our fellow citizens. There are few who may not care for independence, but the whole nation is not. You can’t just generalize.
Frankly speaking, as we read this article, one feels demotivated and says to himself, he is not worth patriotic and eventually, he will end up not caring about anything. Guys, motivate, talk positive, Be optimistic. There are lots of my fellow indians, who love our country and are proud to be an Indian. Don’t change their minds by pointing a finger at them. Everybody has issues in life, some had to move into another country for thier livelihood. In fact these are the guys who miss their country and support it in somehow or the other. The same guys might have cursed, if they didn’t move.
Be proud and make others feel proud of their country in whatever way they can….
NRI and Proud INDIAN….
hi,
very nice blog but I hv something to opine about people moving to other countries for different career options. U r absolutely right to think India has lots of potential and Its true we can also create scope by ourself. But India does not want to invest money on Research and development as United states/ other countries invests and gives lots of priorities for Research. Again Im not complaining about India, but it has its own priorities, it concentrates on manufacture, pharma, IT. SO each country has its own priorities to establish. Its important that we as students first become experts in whichever country it is and serve all countries and not forget motherland. This way we can also create scope for every field in India. Appreciating Sunita williams was normal since all countries, always consider Indians has the best brain and they all admire So let us also admire and appreciate Indians where ever they r born Since “Indian” in genes which is not just by visiting India but nationality comes in genes.
Nice article!!!
I agree to some what point of @anu. There is very less scope in R&D in India as lack of proper funding & motivation. You can see this scenario in IT sector. We termed us as a IT power which unfortunately I never felt or supported or believed that we are IT power as we do not have any big/good product based company like Microsoft, google, apple etc etc. We are dependent on other countries instead of the service based companies are in India. when they are down then we are down. So, real power means self dependent, innovation etc. This is all because all are here to make money whether that is IT giant infosys or others.. why can’t they invest on R&D work or make a product based company???
I wrote about this last year: http://iankits.blogspot.com/2008/09/proud-to-be-of-what.html
I request big giants to invest some money on R&D from there gigantic profit in thousand of crores.
Namskar
MY dear friends i read this blog first time and i read the definition of patriotism and liked it. Today i feel proud that my Indian became good with written theory But i follow that policy where Mr. Gandhi said that dream are best and feeling are its branches but every thing comes true when you do any thing to complete it. Today in every corner every educated person talk in this matter but i want to know how many person do any thing for their country . Only 1 or 2 percent .Some person think but not able to do any thing .So i think we should come close to became power and one source which have capacity to change.so dear friends i am requesting that any person who have great feelings for our country send some detail on my mail . bez i want to make a one source where i combine all powers. so plz give 1 mint attention towards it and think about ur self.
Jai Hind