Mesmerising children with his mantra for success, President A P J Abdul Kalam Wednesday asked them to do hard work, dream and acquire knowledge to become great.
"You must sweat. To become great you must dream, acquire knowledge and do hard work," he said in a lively interactive session with children at the India House here on the first day of his three-day visit to the country.
Kalam, whose visit is the first-ever here by an Indian President, asked children to acquire knowledge continuously. "Knowledge is the greatest wealth a human being can have," he said.
The President took a variety of questions ranging from science to religion and from the visit of US President George W Bush to his days as a missile scientist. To a question whether he supported the Indo-US nuclear deal, Kalam said the US President was in New Delhi recently and cooperation in the nuclear area was discussed.
Appreciating a question as to whether science could usher in peace, the President gave examples like how radiation could be used to cure cancer and nuclear energy could be used to make a bomb.
"Science is innocent. It is for human welfare," he explained.
He asked the children to repeat after him that learning gives creativity which leads to thinking, thinking produces knowledge, and knowledge makes you great.