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Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday, 11 April said atrocities against minorities and Dalits were increasing in the country and such incidents, if unchecked, could harm democracy. He also called for rejection of "divisive policies and politics".
Delivering the first SB Rangnekar Memorial lecture at the Panjab University, his alma mater, Singh also said a "dangerous and false binary" of choosing between freedom and development was surfacing in the country's political discourse and that it must be rejected.
He expressed concern over the alleged attempts being made to divide people.
The former prime minister asserted that freedom of a country did not mean the freedom of just its government.
"It is the freedom of people, which, in turn is not the freedom only of its privileged and powerful, but the freedom of every Indian,” Singh added.
He stressed that without a firm commitment to this idea of freedom, democracy would not survive.
Invoking B R Ambedkar, he said there was a need to reassert commitment to maintain India's freedom and Independence.
A dangerous and false binary "that we have to choose between freedom and development" was surfacing in the Indian political discourse, he said, "which must be firmly rejected".
"The argument was put to Mahatma Gandhi, the Father of our Nation, that good governance and development are better than swaraj (self rule)," he said, adding, that the people of the country firmly rejected the idea advanced by colonial forces.
The noted economist also said it was important to maintain strong focus on containing growing economic inequality.
"What is required is stronger social and political reawakening to the principle of equality – social, economic and political – for the sake of equality and as a mark of our commitment to democracy. In the short term, pro-equality policies may make growth more expensive, but the growing inequality is, in the long term, a far greater danger to economic well being and sustained growth," Singh said in his speech at the varsity.
Singh was addressing the gathering on the topic: The Seventieth Anniversary of our Independence – Strengthening the roots of our Democracy. Rangnekar was one of the founders of the economics department of the varsity.
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