A. P. J. Abdul Kalam
A. P. J. Abdul Kalam
Avul Pakir Jainulabdeen "A. P. J." Abdul Kalamwas the 11th President of India from 2002 to 2007. A career scientist turned politician, Kalam was born and raised in Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu, and studied physics and aerospace engineering. He spent the next four decades as a scientist and science administrator, mainly at the Defence Research and Development Organisationand Indian Space Research Organisationand was intimately involved in India's civilian space program and military missile development efforts. He thus came to be known...
NationalityIndian
ProfessionStatesman
Date of Birth15 October 1931
CountryIndia
It's when children are 15, 16 or 17 that they decide whether they want to be a doctor, an engineer, a politician or go to the Mars or moon. That is the time they start having a dream, and that's the time you can work on them. You can help them shape their dreams.
Where there is righteousness in the heart, there is harmony in the house; when there is harmony in the house, there is order in the nation; when there is order in the nation, there is peace in the world.
If four things are followed - having a great aim, acquiring knowledge, hard work, and perseverance - then anything can be achieved.
Great teachers emanate out of knowledge, passion and compassion.
I was in high school when Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru unfurled India's flag in New Delhi.
Over the years, I had nurtured the hope to be able to fly; to handle a machine as it rose higher and higher in the stratosphere was my dearest dream.
When you look at the light bulb above you, you remember Thomas Alva Edison. When the telephone bell rings, you remember Alexander Graham Bell. Marie Curie was the first woman to win the Nobel Prize. When you see the blue sky, you think of Sir C.V. Raman.
We must get rid of fossil fuels by developing injection systems for automobiles, which can run on bio-fuel.
Where do the evils like corruption arise from? It comes from the never-ending greed. The fight for corruption-free ethical society will have to be fought against this greed and replace it with 'what can I give' spirit.
For success of any mission, it is necessary to have creative leadership. Creative leadership is vital for government, non-governmental organisations as well as for industries.
I have met 18 million youth, and each wants to be unique.
There are a number of women who have brought about immense change in society.
When I took over as president, I studied the Constitution, and the more I studied it, the more I realised that it does not prevent the president of India from giving the nation a vision. So when I went and presented this vision in Parliament and in legislative assemblies; everyone welcomed it, irrespective of party affiliations.
There is not enough funding for basic sciences in India. We have to invest in a big way, and I am pushing that idea.