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Peace, friendship and humanism
The broad national consensus on our foreign policy normally transcends party politics and cuts across party lines. As a matter of fact, the roots of our foreign policy can be found even in our movement for freedom. From that time onwards, we had laid down certain basic aspects of our foreign policy. Naturally, with the changing world situation, some more aspects were added to it, and sometimes the presentation was changed. But the basic approaches have remained the same. I think this is the reason why we have always come to correct judgments and correct assessment of situations.
The striving for peace in the world, willingness to work on the basis of co-existence and co-operation with all nations of the world, aspirations for an equal and just economic order, and unfailing support to the struggle to ensure freedom and human dignity — these are the guiding principles of our foreign policy which draw sustenance and strength from our cultural traditions and our freedom movement.
Nehru's Three "Epochs"
Recently 1 came across the tribute paid to Nehru in 1965 by Martin Luther King, Jr. the famous leader of the black movement who as a matter of fact was also a leader of humanity. I was rather amazed at the insight of the man into Nehru's life. He said: "Jawaharlal Nehru was a man of three extraordinary epochs. He was a leader in the long anti-colonial struggle to free his own land and to inspire a fighting will in other lands under bondage".
This was his first epoch.
The second was: "He lived to see victory and to move then to another epochal confrontation — the fight for peace after World War II. In this climacteric struggle he did not have Gandhi at his side, but he did have the Indian people, now free in their own great Republic. It would be hard to overstate Nehru's and India's contributions in this period. It was a time fraught with the constant threat of a devastating finality for mankind. There was no moment in this period free from the peril of atomic war. In these years Nehru was a towering world force skillfully inserting the peace will of India between the ranging antagonisms of the great powers of East and West."