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

As my father [Javāharlāl Nehrū] said, you have to keep an open mind, but you have to pour something into it – otherwise ideas slip away like sand between your fingers.

I’m trained to difficulties; difficulties can’t be eliminated from life.

One must beware of ministers who can do nothing without money, and those who want to do everything with money.

The future doesn’t frighten me, even if it threatens to be full of other difficulties.

Mankind will endure when the world appreciates the logic of diversity.

The purpose of life is to believe, to hope, and to strive.

I began to travel by myself, in Europe, when I was eight years old. At that age I was already on the move between India and Swizerland, Switzerland and France, France and England. Administering my own finances like an adult.

We always said that our struggle was not only against the British as representatives of colonialism, it was against all the evil that existed in India. The evil of the feudal system, the evil of the system based on caste, the evil of economic injustice.

I don’t mind if my life goes in the service of the nation. If I die, every drop of my blood will invigorate the nation.

You don’t help a country by supporting a military regime that denies any sign of democracy, and what defeated Pakistan was its military regime.

I learned very soon to get along by myself.

I cannot understand how anyone can be an Indian and not be proud.

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

There is not love where there is no will.

My father was a saint. I’m not.

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.

Wherever you have friends that’s your country, and wherever you receive love, that’s your home.

The hour is fast approaching, on which the Honor and Success of this army, and the safety of our bleeding Country depend.

No country can really develop unless its citizens are educated.

Loyalty to country always. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it.

The greatest service which can be rendered any country is to add a useful plant to its culture.

90% of the work in this country is done by people who don’t feel good.

In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of.

As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.