Mangalore, Apr 1: Former President of India A P J Abdul Kalam encouraged student electorates to exercise their votes in the Lok Sabha Elections 2014 and participate in the largest elections to be held in the world with around 150 million first-time voters in the country.
The Missile Man of India ' interacted with students from various colleges across the region at an interactive programme organised by the Dakshina Kannada district administration as part of Systematic Voters ' Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP) programme at TMA Pai International Convention Hall in the city on Tuesday.
In his inspiring speech, he advocated students to vote for a person of integrity and free from corruption and elect a righteous candidate based on his performance and quality of governance. The most important quality you must see in a leader is that he/she should not be afraid of problems, he said, urging them to cast their votes as it was the most significant privilege and responsibility ' they had.
Speaking on creative performance and its dimensions, he taught students the mantra of knowledge, creativity, righteousness and courage. Learning gives rise to creativity, which in turn gives rise to thinking, which provides knowledge and makes you great. Where there is righteousness in the heart, there is beauty in character, harmony in the home, order in the nation and peace in the world. If you elect a leader who has righteousness in his heart, there will be peace in the world and India needs such a leader,” he said.
He said that qualities such as having a great aim, acquiring knowledge continuously, hard work and perseverance would help them achieve things in life. “Education gives you wings to fly, and achievement comes from fire in your subconscious mind. Wings of fire along with great knowledge will make you fly,” he told the students, reciting lines from his famous poem I will fly '.
The former President also inspired the students to have courage to think differently, travel on unexplored paths and conquer the problems. Every citizen has the right to live with dignity. In a vibrant democracy, an empowered citizen is one who knows his rights and defends them with courage, he said.
As part of the SVEEP programme, an audio CD containing election songs in various languages was unveiled by Mr Kalam.
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