Indira Gandhi Quotes

... where does strength come from? It is not muscle strength any more. It is not also mere intellectual strength. What is strength? Strength is the support of the people.

I think one should do what seems right. And if what seems right involves danger...well, one must risk the danger.

Happiness is such a fleeting point of view - there's no such thing as continual happiness.

All the people who fought for freedom were my heroes. I mean, that was the sort of story I liked reading... freedom struggles and so on.

I refuse to indulge in small talk. And compliments, if at all, I save for after the job is done.

I grew up like a boy, also because most of the children who came to our house were boys.

If I'm happy, I look happy; if I'm angry, I show it. Without worrying about how others may react.

People with clenched fists can not shake hands.

If by happiness you mean ecstasy ... Yes, I've known ecstasy, and it's a blessing to be able to say it because those who can say it are very few. But ecstasy doesn't last long and is seldom if ever repeated.

In India's distant past, when the population was low, the blessing given a woman was, 'May you have many children.' Most of our epics and literature stress this wish, and the idea that a woman should have many children hasn't declined.

Have you ever climbed a mountain? You see, once you arrive at the top of a mountain, you think you've reached the highest point. But it's only an impression that doesn't last long.

Poverty assumes so many aspects here in India. There aren't only the poor that you see in the cities, there are the poor among the tribes, the poor who live in the forest, the poor who live on the mountains. Should we ignore them as long as the poor in the cities are better off? And better off with reference to what? To what people wanted ten years ago? Then it seemed like so much. Today it's no longer so much.

Politics is the art of acquiring, holding, and wielding power.

In any case, I married Feroze Gandhi. Once I get an idea in my head, no one in the world can make me change my mind.

It's a law of life - check it and you'll see it holds true in every situation of life.

Wearing khadi was a badge of honour. It was something one was proud to do.

Sometimes friends are dangerous. We must be very careful about the help friends give us.

The word 'when' is so important for a people, for an individual! If an individual thinks he won't do it, he'll never do it. Even if he's highly intelligent, even if he has countless talents.

I said that my father was not a politician. I, instead, think I am. But not in the sense of being interested in a political career - rather in the sense that I think it necessary to strive to build a certain India, the India I want.

The environmental problems of developing countries are not the side effects of excessive industrialisation but reflect the inadequacy of development.

My grandfather once told me that there were two kinds of people: those who do the work and those who take the credit. He told me to try to be in the first group; there was much less competition.

Just when you think you've achieved something, you realize you've achieved nothing. And still you have to go forward just the same - toward a dream so distant that your road has neither beginning nor end.

You cannot shake hands with a clenched fist.

The people have nothing to fear of me; people have never feared me.

I've always discovered things for myself, in marvelous freedom.

The India I want, I'll never tire of repeating, is a more just and less poor India, one entirely free of foreign influences. If I thought the country was already marching toward these objectives, I'd give up politics immediately and retire as prime minister.

I'm not interested in one label or the other - I'm only interested in solving certain problems, in getting where I want to go.

I want to succeed. And I want to succeed in the best way possible, without caring whether people call my actions leftist or rightist.

Forgiveness is a virtue of the brave.

The doctors advised me not to have even one. My health was still not good, and they said that pregnancy might be fatal. If they hadn't said that to me, maybe I wouldn't have got married. But that diagnosis provoked me, it infuriated me. I answered, 'Why do you think I'm getting married if not to have children? I don't want to hear that I can't have children; I want you to tell me what I have to do in order to have children!'

Without courage, you cannot practice any other virtue. You have to have courage - courage of different kinds: first, intellectual courage, to sort out different values and make up your mind about which is the one which is right for you to follow. You have to have moral courage to stick up to that - no matter what comes in your way, no matter what the obstacle and the opposition is.

I'm told [ Zulfikar Ali] Bhutto is ambitious. I hope he's very ambitious; ambition may help him see reality.

The life I've had, the difficulties, the hardships, the pain I've suffered since I was a child. It's a great privilege to have led a difficult life, and many people in my generation have had this privilege - I sometimes wonder if young people today aren't deprived of the dramas that shaped us.

Nowadays you can no longer let yourself be indoctrinated - the world is changing so fast! Even what you wanted twenty years ago is no longer relevant today; it's outdated.

To become capable, one must have faith in oneself.

Home is wherever I go.

There exists no politician in India daring enough to attempt to explain to the masses that cows can be eaten.

When it's impossible, it's better to stoop to compromise, without resisting and without complaining. People who complain are selfish.

I was happy to be with my parents. I didn't see very much of them, so I was very happy when my father was there and out of jail.

Never forget that when we are silent, we are one. And when we speak we are two.

Satisfied is a word I use only in reference to my country, and I'll never be satisfied for my country. For this reasons I go on taking difficult paths, and between a paved road and a footpath that goes up the mountain, I choose the footpath. To the great irritation of my bodyguards.

India wants to avoid a war at all costs but it is not a one-sided affair, you cannot shake hands with a clenched fist.

There is not love where there is no will.

I certainly won't have an empty life!

It is our duty to create a social milieu in which the young and the socially weak feel that the present and future belong to them.

Without peace there can be no prosperity for any people, rich or poor. And yet, there can be no peace without erasing the harshness of the growing contrast between the rich and the poor.

By now even the word socialism has so many meanings and interpretations. The Russians call themselves socialists, the Swedes call themselves. And let's not forget that in Germany there was also a national socialism.

I fall in love with anything I do and I always try to do it well.

I don't think my father was my mentor.

The question before the advanced nations is not whether they can afford to help the developing nations, but whether they can afford not to do so.

At a certain point the family moved to Jaipur, where no woman could avoid the doli or purdah. They kept her in the house from morning to night, either cooking or doing nothing. [My mother] hated doing nothing, she hated to cook. So she became pale and ill, and far from being concerned about her health, my grandfather said, 'Who's going to marry her now?' So my grandmother waited for my grandfather to go out, and then she dressed my mother as a man and let her go out riding with her brothers.

I've never turned to anybody for advice and counsel. Even when I was a very small child, I had to stand on my feet because of the circumstances of those times, and somehow, the circumstances have remained more or less the same. I have to take my own decisions.

Happiness is a state of mind, you know. I don't think you are permanently happy. One is happy about certain things and not so happy about others.

in today's world no country can be absolutely independent of another. It is a world of interdependence.

Every new experience brings its own maturity and a greater clarity of vision.

That's always been my philosophy. - I've never thought of the consequences of a necessary action.

Life is always full of dangers and I don't think one should avoid dangers.

Finally we promised to limit the birth rate. And this you really didn't believe; you smiled scornfully. Well, even in this things have gone well. The fact is that we have grown by over seventy millions in ten years, but it's also true that we have grown less than many other countries, including the countries of Europe.

I have lived a long life, and I am proud that I spend the whole of my life in the service of my people. I am only proud of this and nothing else. I shall continue to serve until my last breath, and when I die, I can say, that every drop of my blood will invigorate India and strengthen it.

Little by little I changed my mind, and when I was about eighteen, I began to consider the possibility of getting married. Not to have a husband, but to have children.