The Hindu : National : Pratibha’s win a matter of pride: Manmohan

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Wednesday, Jul 25, 2007
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Pratibha’s win a matter of pride: Manmohan

Special Correspondent

Says Tilak would have been happy about her election

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Monday said that social and political leaders like Lokmanya Tilak placed great emphasis on gender equality and on the rights of women.

“That is why the people of Maharashtra, both men and women, have been at the forefront of women’s emancipation and empowerment in our country,” he said.

Releasing a set of commemorative coins here on Monday to mark the 151st birth anniversary of freedom fighter Bal Gangadhar Tilak, the Prime Minister said:

“It is a matter of pride that on a day we commemorate the memory of Lokmanya Tilak, we can also say with pride that our country’s First lady President [Pratibha Patil] happens to be a Maharashtrian. I am sure Lokmanya Tilak would have been a happy person today.”

Expressing his happiness at being associated with the occasion, Dr. Singh said in the year that India celebrates the 60th anniversary of our Independence, the 150th anniversary of the First War of Independence and the 151st birth anniversary of Lokmanya Tilak, the country would have a woman from his homeland as the President.

He recalled that with his electrifying slogan, “Swaraj is my birth-right and I shall have it”, Tilak stirred the Indian people and breathed new life into the struggle for freedom. This became the turning point in the movement for independence.

Dr. Singh said the ‘Swaraj’ of Lokmanya’s conception was all-inclusive. In it, there was as much space for Hindus as for people pursuing other religions.

A votary of Hindu-Muslim unity, Lokmanya Tilak wrote in the journal Kesari: “When Hindus and Muslims jointly ask for Swarajya from a common platform, the British bureaucracy has to realise that its days are numbered.”

“After the First War of Independence, the British had decided not to interfere in matters involving religion. Lokmanya Tilak took advantage of that policy and used the Ganesh festival and Shivaji Jayanti for political and secular mobilisation of people in the cause of freedom from the colonial rule. He was neither bigoted nor communal. He was being both religious and nationalistic. It was a creative use of a religious festival for the larger cause of nation-building and social mobilisation.”

The Prime Minister said Tilak found no contradiction in remaining a devout Hindu and having a secular worldview. This showed his modernism and his enlightenment. He used religion to unite people, not to divide them. “Those who use religion to divide people and to promote hatred must learn from the constructive lessons of Lokmanya Tilak’s life and work,” he said.

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