A CASE IN POINT ... 1

Looking smart and bright, my young friend. Bravo! That's the way. But remember, appearances will have to be matched with performance also, both in the sphere of academic excellence and in the domain of character development. Read regularly 'The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda' to stay secure in both. God bless you in all your endeavours and may continued success be your constant companion in the service of the motherland, the mother who looks on with longing eyes to witness the triumphant return of her son in glory, ready to take on the challenges facing her with the mighty arm of efflorescent manhood!

To be born in India is a privilege which few realise who have been blessed with such good fortune. It is sad to see so many of our young men and women settling in the West, especially, America, after completion of higher studies there simply because of the opportunities they afford, the affluence they offer. Not a thought for the motherland that nurtured and nourished the babe to youth, not a glance back to the deprivation of one's countrymen that suffer by the hundreds of millions humiliating existence here on earth while a few reap the harvest of their labour to solely savour the spice of life. What about one's basic duty for one's motherland? What about lending one's ploughshare of labour for the land of one's birth when one has from birth enjoyed all the gifts it has showered on one? Whither Indian culture when Indian children grow up to go abroad to study and make a life there never to return? Is this the hallmark of culture that makes betrayal its benchmark? How can tens of thousands of our brightest young people seek residence in the developed West when our own country needs their informed labour of love to rise up in the comity of nations to occupy her rightful place? How may the billion-strong poor people who feed us by starving themselves ever see the light of day if in independent India the creme de la creme of our youth choose to leave the land of their birth to seek translocation elsewhere? My young and ambitious friends, think. Think deep, ponder hard before you take the perfidious plunge, I say. The masses may wait but will not forgive when their hour comes. Jai Hind!