When America was taking her first step towards independence a large part of Asia was about to be engulfed in a wave of European colonialism. India won her freedom after a long and difficult struggle but in the process also opened the way to liberation of other subject peoples of Asia and Africa. This was but part of man's intrinsic striving towards liberty, justice and equality. However, for newly-independent countries political freedom was only the first step on a long and arduous journey towards economic growth and social justice.
Since the attainment of independence in 1947, India has set some major goals in national and international spheres. India's foremost concern is of course the preservation of her hard-won freedom and protection of her frontiers. We seek to achieve this through self-reliant growth as well as by promoting a climate of confidence in our region and establishing a network of co-operative relations with all nations, more particularly our neighbours. Our second objective, as important as the first and interdependent with it, is to bring about a socio-economic transformation of our society in order to tackle age-old problems of underdevelopment. Our democracy seeks to assure equality of opportunity to our people, irrespective of their religion, language, caste or creed.
Our third objective is to reduce tensions and promote peace and co-operation in the region, based on respect for national independence of each country and without any foreign interference. Fourthly, along with other developing countries, we seek to build a new world economic order, which is based on justice and equality and which permits developing nations an adequate voice in the management of international economic environment so that they can gain assured access to resources and technology necessary for their development.
Finally, we support all efforts towards detente which should be extended to all areas of the world if the world is to move from peace through nuclear terror to a more lasting structure of peace durably based on equality, justice and international co-operation.
