Together We Can Change This Country And Impact The World
Rahul Gandhi

(Speech during the  debate on the Motion of Confidence in the Lok Sabha on July 22, 2008)

Mr. Speaker, Sir, thank you for letting me speak on behalf of the Government. Yesterday, while I was thinking about what I would say in this House, I came to a simple conclusion. I decided that it is important at this point not to speak as a Member of a political Party, but to speak as an Indian. I decided, as I said, that I would not speak as a member of a political party but I would speak as an Indian.

You are also an Indian and you should also speak as an Indian.   I would go further to say that you do speak as an Indian and I do not doubt that.  So, I decided that what I would do is that I would take a step that a lot of our politicians normally do not do. 

I decided that I will make a central assumption in my speech. The assumption is that everybody in this House, regardless of which party they come from, whether they come from the BJP or the Shiv Sena or the Samajwadi Party or the BSP or the Congress Party, speak in the interest of the nation.   So, I would like to say that this is the assumption that I will make throughout my speech.

Yesterday, I thought about why we are meeting here today, why is it that this House needs to meet and I came to the conclusion that we are meeting because there is a serious problem in India and the problem is our energy security.

Poverty is directly connected to energy security and I will explain how. In my speech, I will explain to the hon. Member as to how poverty is directly connected to energy security.   Once again, I would request everybody to give me ten minutes and to listen to me for ten minutes.  That is all I ask for.

 Three days ago, I went to Vidarbha and there, I met a young lady who has three sons.  The young lady, Sasikala, a landless labourer, lives with Rs. 60 a day. Her husband who goes to work in a field nearby earns Rs. 90 a day and with the total earning that they make, they have put their three children in a private school.  I spent an hour with these people.  They live in a slum.  I spoke to the sons and I spoke to the mother.  The eldest son dreams of becoming a Collector, the middle son dreams of becoming an engineer and the younger son wants to do a private job.   When I asked Sasikala as to whether she thinks that her children will be successful or not, she looked at me and said “Absolutely”. 

As I was walking out of the House, I noticed that there was no electricity in the house.  I told the children that when I was small, I used to study in the evening and how do they study. The children pointed towards a little lamp, a brass lamp that was there.  They said, “We study using that lamp.”  This problem of energy security reflects itself everyday with all of us; it reflects itself among the poor, like in the house of Sashikala; it reflects itself with industry; and it reflects among all Indians.

Energy effects India; energy effects India’s growth; and energy is responsible for allowing us to grow at nine per cent and that growth is responsible for allowing us to to create programmes to help poor, like those the BJP has done, like the PMGSY; and like those the Congress has done, like the NREGP and guaranteed education. 

The point that I am making here is if we do not secure our energy supply into the future, growth will stop and we will not be able to fight poverty which is something that every single Member of this House wants to do.

I have said what the problem is.  I would go back to Vidharba to see what the solution could possibly be.  I would go to the house of another young lady called Kalawati, who had nine children.

I would go to the house of Kalawati.  I am glad you find that funny.  But Kalawati is a person whose husband committed suicide.  So, I would urge you to respect her.  I would take you to the house of Kalawati, which I also visited three days ago.  Kalawati is a woman with nine children whose husband committed suicide three years ago.  Her husband committed suicide because he was dependent on only one crop, the cotton crop.  When I asked Kalawati as to why her husband committed suicide, her answer was  that he was dependent on only one source of income.

I asked Kalavati as to what did you do.  Kalavati responded by telling me that I diversify. When I asked the widow lady as to how she resolves her problem, she said that instead of sowing one crop, she now sows three crops.  She told me how she bought two buffaloes and now has milk as a source of income.  She also told me, most importantly, that she dug a little pond which she fills with water and uses as an insurance policy when it does not rain.

I spoke to two poor families.  One of them was called Mrs. Kala. Mrs. Kala said that she had diversified her income sources and she has used that to stabilize her family and bring up her nine children.

Sir, at the very least, nuclear energy is going to act like Mrs. Kala’s pond and it is going to act as an insurance policy for this country in times of need.  At its maximum, nuclear energy is going to act like Mrs. Kala’s main crop.

So, the problem is that the way our nuclear industry is positioned today, it is going to do neither. It is neither going to act as an insurance policy nor is it going to act or have  the potential to act as a fundamental source of energy.  And, the reason it is not going to do so is because the hands of our scientists, the hands of our establishment are tied; they are tied because they do not have fuel on one hand, and on the other hand  they do not have investment and technology.

Sir, I am very proud to say that our Prime Minister Shri Manmohan Singhji has recognized both the problem and a potential solution. But it would be unfair of me not to accept that Shri Vajpayee also saw the problem and also, in his time, worked on the solution. Now, I have stated and all of us know that there is a problem with  regard to our energy security in this country, and that we need to think about it in the long term. It is a problem that all of us need to solve working together.

As I said, senior leaders have also established that the way forward is diversification and reliance on more than one source of energy, a balanced portfolio that includes nuclear, hydrocarbon, solar and wind among others.

 But, Sir,  it is not enough to identify a problem and a potential solution.  The magic of what Shri Manmohan Singhji is doing is that within the problem, he has identified an opportunity that is significantly larger than the problem itself.  The opportunity our Prime Minister has identified is based on a simple fact.  It is based on the fact that over the next 30-40 years, two countries are going to use the largest bulk of new energy that comes on line.  These countries – China and India – have the ability to define the way the world’s energy moves

Sir, what I am suggesting is that instead of looking at our energy problem as a problem, we start to look at our energy usage as an opportunity.  Like a big buyer who goes to any market, we have the ability to shape the global energy industry, and energy is like no other industry in the world. Energy, as I said earlier, is used everywhere, in everything and in every aspect of economic and social life. Energy has destroyed nations and it has built nations.

Our old opponent, the British, grew to their prominence because they control coal. The United States today controls hydrocarbons. It has a large emphasis on hydrocarbons, and we all know how powerful they are. What I am suggesting is that we start to think like a big country, like a powerful country. Instead of worrying about how the world will impact us, we start worrying about how we will impact the world.

Many years ago, this country embarked on a path which many people did not believe in. We developed an industry called, IT industry and the telecom industry. Very few people believed at that time that India would ever play a major role in this industry. Very few people believed that the computer would have anything to do with empowering the poor and with changing the way this country worked. Yet, today all of us together see the impact of the computer. We see the revolutionary impact that IT and communications has had on this country, and it is important that we do not forget this. It is important that we do not forget this because I believe we are at the cross roads, very similar to the cross roads we were at when the decision on IT was to be made.

The decision here is not about three per cent energy or seven per cent energy. It is not about India’s usage of nuclear energy. If we look at the big picture here, it is about whether India can become a global power in a type of energy that is going to be very important in the future. We all know the problems caused by hydrocarbons. We know about pollution.

Earlier, one of the Members asked me to point out what is the connection between energy and poverty. We know the link between us depending on hydrocarbons and prices in India today. Sir, when we think about energy, when we think about nuclear energy, we must think about the poorest in the country. Contrary to what most people believed, when we thought about IT in this country, we were thinking about the poor in this country. It is something that is hard to cross because it is counterintuitive. But one must not underestimate the connections between industry, between energy and between the poor.

Sir, I have taken a lot of time. So, I do not want to go on for ever. But I want to make one last submission. I am very happy this House is now listening to.

The difference between a powerful country and a country that is not powerful and does not have a similar impact on the world stage is that the powerful country thinks about how it will impact the world. The country that is not so powerful thinks about how the world will impact it.

Sir, it does not matter which Government runs this country. Many Governments will run this country in the future. But it does matter how we think about our position in the world. What is important is that we stop worrying about how the world will impact us, we stop being scared about how the world will impact us and we step out and worry about how we will impact the world.

Sir, as I said earlier, I speak today not as a Congress person or a Congressman but as an Indian. I would like to say two other things before I conclude. The first is that we are all building this country together. We might have different views about how this country should be built. We might have different opinions on what we should do. But essentially we sit in this room together and we have to solve our problems together. This is what differentiates us and this is what gives us our true power that any voice can be heard in this room, that any voice can disrupt any other voice in this room. I am being serious. It is uncomfortable for me. But I am very proud of it that every voice can be heard in this country.

I would like to conclude by saying two things. The first thing is that we must never, ever let fear be our guide. We must never take decisions based on the fear of the unknown or what is going to happen if we act. We must only act with one rule and that is courage. The second thing I would like to say is that we are a country of a billion people; 70 per cent of us are young. I am old for this country; I am much above the average age. It is important to realise that this country is brimming with confidence and brimming with self-belief. Another point we must never forget when we take decisions as leaders in this country is that we have to believe in that, in our people and we have to have confidence in what we are capable of doing. We have to have confidence in what they are doing.

            I think these are guides not only for Congress leaders, these are guides for every single Indian that when you do act, whoever you are, whatever opinion you have, act with courage and act with confidence. With that, together, we can change this country and impact the world.

            To conclude, I would like to support our hon. Prime Minister and like to say that he has shown tremendous courage and confidence in the Indian people and I would also like to say and I say this as a youngster from this Party and as a youngster from that Party and all those other Parties that it does not matter what happens here today. What matters is that we start working together and we together try to solve the problems of this country. 

            I would like to support the motion of the hon. Prime Minister. Thank you very much.