Favouring human values bridged by spirituality, President A P J Abdul Kalam on Thursday said prosperity was important to avoid conflicts and wars while ways and means should be found for rooting out fundamental causes of extremism.
"Prosperity of nations is important for the prosperity of the world and to avoid conflicts and war. The centuries of the learning from different civilisations like India and Greece should enable us to formulate ideas and systems to bring prosperity and reduce disparities," Kalam said at the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy, a major think-tank in Greece.
"One of the main drivers would be human values bridged by spirituality of religions. We also need to find ways and means of rooting out the fundamental causes of extremism," he said.
The President said that there was a need for finding solutions for depleting sources of energy, continuously degrading environment and the scarcity of water threatening humanity.
"I believe humanity as a whole has to work with focused national, regional and international missions, which itself will be a major unifying factor and pave the way for peace and prosperity for the whole mankind," he said.
Kalam, 75, quoting Tamil poet Saint Thiruvalluvar said the important elements that constitute a nation were -- being disease free; wealth; high productivity; harmonious living and strong defence and, "We have to find how we can provide all these elements to all the citizens of the nation on an equitable basis for happiness for all. This may result in an extremism free world, a peaceful world."
The President went on to narrate his own experiences during his domestic tours and recalled his interaction with a Buddhist monk in a Northeastern state.
"When you remove 'I' and 'me' from your mind, you will eliminate ego; if you get rid of ego, hatred towards fellow human beings will vanish; if the hatred goes out of our mind, the violence in thinking and action will disappear; if violence in our mind is taken away, peace springs in human minds. Then peace and peace and peace alone will blossom in society," he said.
"India is in an ascending economic trajectory, with continuously rising foreign exchange reserves with moderate rate of inflation... our technological competence and value systems and civilisational heritage are also highly respected," Kalam said and presented the vision 2020 for the country whereby he expected those living below poverty level will come to zero.
He said by the year 2020, India would have realised energy security and would be working towards energy independence. "Everyone will have an opportunity to take up and complete courses of choice in higher education," Kalam said.
The President said that for achieving the vision, Indian had devised a "tool" -- National Prosperity Index -- which comprised annual growth rate GDP, improvement of quality of life particularly those living below poverty life and adoption of a value system derived from the civilisational heritage.
The improvement in quality of life will be indicated peace in families and communities, reduction in corruption index, reduction of court cases, elimination of violence against children and women and communal tension. "All efforts are directed towards improving the NPI of the nation at any point of time.
Kalam said the co-existence of quantitative and qualitative issues in policy making were common in India and Greece. "I am sure Greece and India in conjunction with the European Union could collaborate in giving a scientific outlook to policy making," he added.
