There is nothing wrong about it. It is a question not of strength but of the attitudes and philosophies that ultimately moves one to act. That is more important. And it is the philosophy of Mahatma Gandhi that guides us. This non-alignment approach, really speaking was inherent in a form, before, and during the days of freedom struggle. It is a gift coming from the independence movement. Has it grown out of nothing? No. It has grown out of a very long history of freedom struggle. When the Cold War was in its intense form this present formula was worked out. So, we have to ultimately come to this and try to work creatively. It is not enough to talk in terms of catchy phrases about non-alignment and things like that. It is now not a question of formulating the theory of non-alignment, but, applying it to a given situation. And that is what is more important. Application of theory of non-alignment in the coming days, in the coming decade, is going to be more important. And therefore, I would like to say, it is going to be a challenge to the policy makers and diplomats of India. India should be aware of this situation, that there will be pressures on the non-alignment movement, to divide us and so on, and we will have to work creatively to see that we do not get ourselves divided, but at the same time, we should not lose our initiative in this particular field. According to me, the main strength behind non-alignment is self-reliance.
Yesterday, I think Shri Chandrajit Yadav made that point, that this mantram of non-alignment by itself is not going to help unless you build your nonalignment on a strong self-reliant economy. Non-alignment part of the foreign policy is also a policy of self reliance. For that matter ultimately you cannot divorce foreign policy from internal policies. We will have to build India on a more equitable basis, on a more strong basis. Now a days we heard less from the Government about socialism. I hope they have not forgotten about it. We have made amendment of the Constitution and we have accepted it as one of our objectives.
Shri Indrajit Gupta : (Basirhat) : The less we hear the better, that also has become a mantram.
Shri Y. B. Chavan : Even as a mantram, that way at least, we should hear from responsible people, it will be much better if we hear more and more of it. I am not so pessimistic as Mr. Indrajit Gupta is. I have had some experience of this party’s Government functioning.
Now, I come to the question of Indian ocean as a zone of peace. This has become another mantram. I quite agree that we do want Indian ocean to be peaceful zone. I am not going to compromise on this or trying to withdraw from it. The demand will have to be much more organised and its content will have to be a little more aggressive. Unless it is more aggressive nothing is going to happen. But I can tell you, that when we talk about Indian ocean as a peace zone with some of the Western diplomats, they feel this is from my experience I have learnt - we are uttering it as a mantram. It is not being taken very seriously.
