The contribution of Bharat Ratna Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel is also important in maintaining the unity of the country. On the occasion of Sardar Patel’s upcoming birthday (Thursday), here is an excerpt from his speech given in Mumbai on January 18, 1948: We consider India a great country, so why are you afraid of small things like Pakistan? What is there in this, but we should use our brains and should understand and unite among ourselves and raise India higher. Then we can take leadership of entire Asia. There is no doubt in my heart about this, that is why my effort is to make India one. Some people feared that this would not happen; some kings also had doubts in their hearts that who knows what would happen next? Some of our socialist brothers also doubted that kings would get positions in India.
Some people used to say that now the king will do whatever he wants and we will not be able to do anything. I said, brother, be patient. We have become free, the king has also become free, he will also take care of his country, self-respect will be born in his heart, some sense of pride will be born in our India, Lord Buddha was born. He left what little kingdom he had. He neither kept a gun nor a cannon with him.
But he reached outside India. He reached China and Japan. He reached Ceylon and Bombay. Why are you nervous? In the same way, I say that the wealth that is present in the earth in India has to be extracted by digging it. There is so much wealth here that no one has ever seen. Other countries do not have as much wealth as our land. We have to remove it but for this we will have to work hard. On one hand you ask the workers to do less work and ask for higher prices. In this way you will avoid insolvency. The country will not be able to function like this. I actually want the welfare of the workers also. But how will that happen? It would be good if we produce money and then distribute it among ourselves, but if we do not produce anything then neither the laborer will get anything, nor the rich will get it, nor we will get anything.
It is said again and again that we need leadership. Leadership has become the way of life in the country today. If someone wants to become a leader then first give a speech and abuse the capitalist people, without that it does not work, people do not believe. One or two abusive kings just got leadership again. But what good will this kind of leadership do to anyone? I can speak even to kings and tell them very true things. Similarly, I love the capitalists, but I also give them stern words. If I understand that India will be benefited by destroying the capital of every capitalist in our country, then I will be the first to destroy it, I will not lag behind.
There is no need for anyone to teach me socialism. It has been many years since I supported Gandhi, since then I had decided that if I wanted to work in public life, I should not own any property. Just think, from then till today I have not kept any of my things. Neither do I have any bank account, nor do I have any land, nor do I have any house of my own, I do not want to keep all this. If I keep it, I consider it a sin. If someone teaches me the lesson of socialism, he will have to learn again how to run a public life. Talks go on a lot. Someone changed my name to Sardar. Now about the Sardar-house here in Bombay (now Mumbai), it was published in a newspaper of Calcutta (now Kolkata) that Sardar has big houses in Bombay. They are named after him.
Now my respect increases a lot with the name Sardar and maybe I can also get money on credit from it.
Go. Such fraud is prevalent in our country. But I want to tell you that today our job is to create wealth from the earth and build big factories. I told you that if we want to protect our country, we will have to have a good army. For that we will have to strengthen the Central Government. It has to be protected and strengthened means that people across the country should be behind it. if you
You should tell the workers that you should make cannons, guns, ammunition, everything for your army. Steel is needed for cannons and guns. In our country there is a lot of iron lying in our soil. Till today the British used to bring iron from outside and take away our money. Now after Swaraj, will we bring iron from outside? No, now we have to create that here. Tata has a factory here. The amount of iron required to build houses across the country is not enough, so where should we get iron for our army? That’s why today there is control on steel and it cannot be broken. We can break the control of grains, clothes, sugar but we cannot break the control of steel. We have very little steel here. So wherever there is greater need, we give there.
Today, there are frequent strikes in Tata factories also. If a new government factory is to be built then there should be no strike. We need petrol. We need coal. There are many things to tell. But when I say, they say it is our bitter criticism. I don’t do witter criticism, I want to enter your heart and tell you how after so many centuries you have got this opportunity today. Today, after a thousand years, our India has become more organized than it was ever before. It’s okay if you read your history.